Late last night, John Morton, the head of Immigration and Customs Enforcement, sent a heartfelt missive to his agents and dozens of congressional staff preceding his official resignation today. In hopes of offering the public a rare opportunity to look into the inner workings of the agency, we have posted the email here.
To my beloved friends, agents, and all of you who I didn’t get a chance to know well:
After one too many PBR and Jameson combos, I scrawled my phone number in the bathroom of The Raven. If you wish to contact me after today, please use the number posted there.
It’s Easter break, and I’m lonely. But deep down, I cherish moments like this—alone, sad, pensive in the moonlight over DC—this is when I get my best thinking done.
Senator Jeff Sessions wants me to resign. So does DreamActivist.org. Well, you know what? I just might. I’m tired of being everything to everyone. I have to be tough and be friends with the Federation for American Immigration Reform. I have be gentle and grant prosecutorial discretion. I have to wear a suit every day, smile as I walk down the hall, and not let a soul know that deep down inside, I’ve given every part of me away to someone else.
Prick me, do I not bleed? Prick you, all of you. I’ve done my best to play the Washington game, to be Obama’s top immigrant cop. But it’s not me.
After deporting people at breakneck speed, I’ve decided to take the slow road: heliculture. As of this day, I am no longer the Director of Immigration and Customs Enforcement. I’m opening up a snail farm.
Why snails? Well, I got the idea after staring at Senator Sessions’s slimy little ears, and because simply, there is nothing more majestic than sitting outside with a glass of a vintage merlot at sunset, overlooking your snail patch as they do God’s work of turning slime into money. Money for me. Aside from all the foodies in DC that’ll love a local, organic escargot producer, I’ll make a killing selling them for pets and makeup products.
I was meant for this, really. To Washington, I say: it’s not you, it’s me. Well, maybe it is you, and probably me too. After sequestration, departmental cutbacks made me get rid of my Zen rock garden and I just haven’t been the same. I need peace and tranquility. I need love, the love only my snails can give.
So here I am, riding off into the sunset. No more judiciary hearings, no more lawsuits, no more cluttered inboxes full of people demanding that I stop their mom’s deportation. Just me and my little slimy friends. All in all, it’s not that different than being the head of ICE.
With love,
John Morton
Note: This article is satirical in nature. Happy April Fools’ Day…