President Bush yesterday nominated an executive with a leading engineering company to be the second-in-command at the Department of Homeland Security. The executive, Michael P. Jackson, also served as the deputy secretary at the Transportation Department from 2001 to 2003.
Jackson would replace James M. Loy, deputy secretary to outgoing Homeland Security Secretary Tom Ridge.
Meanwhile, Asa Hutchinson resigned yesterday from his high-ranking job at Homeland Security, and associates said he is strongly considering running for governor in his home state of Arkansas.
Jackson, who has bounced between the government and the private sector since the 1980s, has a reputation as an effective manager. If confirmed, he would be the top deputy to the nominee for homeland security secretary, Michael Chertoff, a federal appeals court judge in New Jersey and former top Justice Department official.
White House officials and members of Congress have said they want Chertoff and his team to make management of the 180,000-employee department, created by a merger of 22 agencies, more rigorous and businesslike.
Jackson, a former political science professor at Georgetown University, worked for President George H.W. Bush, first as Cabinet liaison at the White House and later as chief of staff at the Transportation Department when now-White House Chief of Staff Andrew H. Card Jr. was transportation secretary. During the Clinton administration, Jackson ran a division of Lockheed Martin Corp. that worked on transportation issues.
In the current president's first term, Jackson was the Transportation Department's deputy secretary. After the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, he helped create the Transportation Security Administration (TSA), which is now part of Homeland Security. In 2003, he became a Washington-area representative of AECOM Technology Corp., a firm with 19,000 employees that handles engineering and construction management for large projects by companies and government agencies.
A 2003 book about homeland security called "After," by Steven Brill, said Jackson is "whip smart when it came to budget and operational details, a real manager who everyone seemed to think was destined for bigger things."
Ridge is leaving the job Feb. 1, while Loy and Hutchinson are staying until March 1. Ridge said he is mulling what to do in private life, and Loy said he is looking forward to living in a home he and his wife are finishing in Williamsburg.
Hutchinson, a former Republican House member and administrator of the Drug Enforcement Administration, has run Homeland Security's biggest division, the Border and Transportation Security directorate, which includes TSA and the thousands of customs and immigration inspectors at the nation's airports and borders.
