Aguilar retires from CBP

   David Aguilar is retiring at the end of March as head of U.S. Customs and Border Protection. The Department of Homeland Security was a bit sloppy in the title it used for Aguilar in a press release describing his career achievements and thanking him for his service.
   The statement referred to Aguilar as commissioner of CBP. In reality, he ran the agency. But he was never commissioner. A career civil servant, he became acting commissioner when the political appointee he worked under, Alan Bersin, left office at the end of 2011. And in recent months, CBP officials have gone back to referring to Aguilar as deputy commissioner, the position he was appointed to, because the statute of limitations on having an acting commissioner had expired.
   It’s a semantic thing. His duties were the same. But DHS, which is usually a stickler for protocol, probably should have used the more accurate title for him.
   DHS did correct one mistake it made. The initial statement that went out said Aguilar served almost three years as commissioner.
   “I want to thank David V. Aguilar for his nearly three years as Commissioner of U.S. Customs and Border Protection, and 31 years of service with the U.S. Border Patrol. A native of South Texas, David began his remarkable CBP career as a Border Patrol agent in 1978, working tirelessly to secure our border,” Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano said.
   A subsequent version of the release on DHS’s Website was changed to thank Aguilar “for his time” as commissioner.