Kevin Kealoha McAleenan (born September 5, 1971)[1] is an American attorney and government official who served as the acting United States secretary of homeland security from April to November 2019.

[10][12] In this position he was in charge of airport operations and responsible for securing the US border while ensuring lawful trade and travel at 329 ports of entry in the United States, as well as 70 locations in more than 40 countries.

[13][19] McAleenan advocated for the implementation of the Trump administration's "Zero Tolerance" policy on immigration, including the prosecution of parents and the separation of children from their families.

[9] In September 2018, McAleenan told the USA Today editorial board he planned to spend more time "analyzing ways to modernize border patrol facilities" and intended to travel to the southwest United States, where most of the migrant children were being held.

But a July 2, 2019 Department of Homeland Security Office of Inspector General report found that some detention facilities in Rio Grande Valley had violated CBP standards by not granting children access to showers or hot meals.

[23][24] President Trump designated McAleenan as Acting United States Secretary of Homeland Security on April 8, 2019, following Kirstjen Nielsen's resignation.

[28] At the time, Alan Bersin, a former assistant Homeland Security secretary for international affairs and former Customs and Border Protection Commissioner who had worked closely with McAleenan, opined that he did his job effectively as a professional public servant in three administrations, Republican and Democrat, but his undoing had been the polarizing environment and a lack of White House support.

[29] Ten months later, on August 14, 2020, the Government Accountability Office released a finding that "upon the resignation of Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen, the express terms of the then existing designation required the Director of the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) to assume that title instead of the Commissioner of Customs and Border Protection (CBP), Kevin McAleenan."

This finding also meant that McAleenan's successor Chad Wolf and his Deputy Acting Secretary Ken Cuccinelli did not appropriately obtain their positions.