One of President Donald Trump’s former Border Patrol goons has been on a tirade against his administration, claiming officials are retreating from the mass deportation crackdown that was initially promised.
Greg Bovino retired as Border Patrol “commander-at-large” earlier this year amid backlash for his leadership in Minnesota, where two protesters were shot dead by federal agents. Now, he is blasting the Trump administration’s supposedly softened immigration policy.
Bovino, 56, has been making his rounds across conservative media, speaking with Megyn Kelly, Alex Jones, and Ann Coulter in the last week, trashing leadership at the Department of Homeland Security along the way.
“You want results?” Bovino said on The Megyn Kelly Show earlier this week. “You create fear. Mass operations. Roving patrols. Zero mixed signals.”
When Kelly questioned him on the recent resignation of Mike Banks, Trump’s chief of Border Patrol, Bovino claimed that the “mass deportations hardliners” were being ousted from the administration.
“I talked to Chief Banks about 30 minutes before coming on your show, and he was quite gracious in what he was saying there,” Bovino said. “What I will say is that Chief Banks and I are both mass deportations people — just like Kristi Noem, Corey Lewandowski and others — mass deportations folks, and we’re all no longer employed by Department of Homeland Security. What does that tell you?”
“There’s a lot of swamp creatures still out there,” he added.
“We’re all no longer working for the Department of Homeland Security. We are all mass deportation hardliners, and I use that term with great pride. Am I an immigration hardliner? You bet,” he continued.
Bovino then said there were still “snakes” working within the administration.
“There’s a lot of snakes, a lot of swamp creatures still out there. So careful, America, still some swamp creatures out there,” he said cryptically. “And before we go mass deportations, and before we return to hardline immigration, those snakes need to leave.”
Bovino’s final year at DHS was marred by controversy after federal agents shot and killed two American citizens, Renee Good and Alex Pretti, during their disastrous crackdown in Minneapolis, Minnesota.
Bovino, using his government social media accounts, claimed that the two protesters—both unarmed at the time they were shot dead—were engaging in “domestic terrorism.”
That prompted the administration to take control of his accounts and remove him from immigration operations in Minneapolis, replacing him with border czar Tom Homan.
He was also called out for his long black trench coat, which some compared to Nazi SS attire. Those accusations were amplified when he later boosted a post online from an anonymous neo-Nazi who supports Adolf Hitler.
