Trump removes Coast Guard commandant, US official says

WASHINGTON: The Trump administration has fired U.S. Coast Guard Commandant Admiral Linda Lee Fagan, the first female uniformed leader of an armed forces branch, a U.S. official told Reuters on Tuesday.

Fox News, which first reported the firing, said Acting Homeland Security Secretary Benjamine Huffman had terminated Fagan for putting diversity issues over border security.

The White House and Department of Homeland Security did not immediately reply to requests for comment on the report. The Coast Guard and Fagan could not immediately be reached.

While the Coast Guard is an armed service, it falls under the Department of Homeland Security and not the Pentagon.

Trump adviser Elon Musk, who leads the new administration’s effort to cut costs across the federal government, alluded to efforts to promote diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) in an X post but did not explicitly confirm the termination of Fagan.

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“Undermining the U.S. military and border security to spend money on racist/sexist DEI nonsense is no longer acceptable,” Musk, the world’s richest man, wrote on X.

Trump has vowed to eliminate DEI programs in federal government agencies.

Earlier, Fox News cited an unidentified senior Department of Homeland Security official as saying Fagan had been fired over concerns about the border, recruitment and “erosion of trust.”

It cited the failure to address border security threats, to recruit and keep staff, mismanagement in acquisitions and an excessive focus on diversity, equity and inclusion initiatives.

Former President Joe Biden nominated Fagan to lead the Coast Guard in 2021. She became the first female uniformed leader of a branch of the U.S. Armed Forces.