An unusual meeting took place in Laredo, Texas as Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas was visiting.
Captured on a border patrol agent’s phone, the video shows a tense and sometimes angry exchange between the border agents and their boss, U.S. Border Patrol Chief Raul Ortiz, on Friday.
Ortiz, a Biden appointee whose major accomplishment since taking office has been to order agents not to use the term “illegal alien” anymore, got into a back-and-forth with several agents.
Related: DHS’ Mayorkas Says He’s Working with Social Media Giants to Circumvent Freedom of Speech
Ortiz admitted that “morale was at an all-time low” and that the U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) was losing too many agents.
“I do think that we’re losing too many agents,” Ortiz said. “As an organization, we gotta start taking care of each other.”
“I get it,” Ortiz said. “You come to work, you’re frustrated. You’re upset because you didn’t get the desired outcome that you want. Doesn’t mean you give up.”
“We’re not,” one agent responded.
“I know you’re not,” Ortiz replied. “That’s why I’m saying, we don’t give up. We stay focused, we continue to do the job and the mission that we signed up for. We all signed up for it, we all raised our hand.”
Ortiz may be a good little woke bureaucratic toady, but is he really the person who should be leading a law enforcement agency during an immigration crisis the likes of which have never been seen in the U.S. before?
It’s kinda hard to say that when…” one agent began to say.
“It’s not hard to say it,” Ortiz shot back. “It may be hard for you to say it, I’ve been doing this for 31 years. It’s not hard for me to say it.”
Other agents chimed in that “you keep releasing criminal aliens into the country.”
“You’re getting bogged down in the policies and the politics,” Ortiz stressed.
How arrogant and out of touch with his people is Ortiz?
Multiple agents then said agents can’t use the term “illegal aliens.”
“You just said it,” Ortiz replied. “Ain’t nothing gonna happen to you.”
It went downhill for Ortiz after that. The border chief pointed out that drug interdiction at the border was saving lives. “And under this administration, in the last year, we’ve got the highest fentanyl deaths in the history of our country,” one person in the room shot back.
With the agents seemingly still not satisfied with the answers they were getting, Ortiz asked them, “Why are you guys getting caught up in semantics? … I’ve been doing this job as long as y’all.”
“That’s the problem, chief,” one agent interjected. “For evil to triumph is for good men to do nothing. That’s exactly what’s happening here. Good men are doing nothing. You’re allowing illegal aliens to be dropped off in communities.”
Sen. James Lankford (R-Okla.) told Fox News that the agents were more like hotel clerks checking people in than law enforcement agents. Indeed, the agents spend so much time processing new arrivals — making sure they get their slip of paper telling them when their court date is before letting them go — they have precious little time to actually patrol the border and protect America from people who wish to do us harm.
It’s only going to get worse when the Biden administration repeals the Title 42 public health rule that allows us to deport at least some of the illegal aliens. When that happens, the number of border apprehensions (and releases) is only going to go higher.
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