As President Joe Biden opens the border to let illegal immigrants in, an increasing number of border Patrol agents are walking out, according to a new report.
According to a report in the Washington Examiner, more than 4,000 agents have left the Border Patrol since October 2020, which amounts to almost a quarter of its workforce.
“The administration is so bad for morale,” an unnamed senior Border Patrol official told the Examiner. “I’m not trying to be political. I’m just speaking facts. It’s become so political. Catch and release is demoralizing for agents.”
By the numbers, the Border Patrol, part of U.S. Customs and Border Protection, has more than 19,000 agents. From October 2020 through April 2024, 4,281 agents left. The average over the three full federal fiscal years in that period is 1,222, far above the average of 996 for the preceding seven years.
The U.S. Border Patrol has lost nearly a quarter of its workforce since Democratic candidate Joe Biden beat incumbent Donald Trump in the 2020 presidential election, and some agents say it is no coincidence.
DETAILS: https://t.co/zX28YLd2Cg pic.twitter.com/EI2a8y7uEI
— Washington Examiner (@dcexaminer) May 24, 2024
The biggest increase has come through early retirements, which averaged 257 per year from 2014 to 2020 but have averaged 529 per year since 2021.
Matthew Hudak, who recently retired as the Border Patrol’s second-in-command, said agents feel frustrated.
“That’s what’s frustrating for agents is so many people are encountered and then ultimately released because there is just no resources for detention,” Hudak said, per the Examiner. “The volume exceeds any practical ability for detention, and there’s a lack of any messaging or policy or action of solid deterrence.”
Democratic Rep. Henry Cuellar of Texas has said he expects an additional 800 Border Patrol agents to retire by the end of this year.
Trump closed the border and Biden opened it up...that's right there for everyone to see and the border policy Biden came up with was a joke
— Gordon Smith (@Virginia1fan) May 24, 2024
Many agents “just get kind of numb,” Chris Clem, who retired as chief of the Yuma, Arizona, sector last year after 27 years with the Border Patrol, said, according to The Free Press.
“We all knew under this administration there’d be a change,” Clem said. “We expect that every time there’s a political change. But when it turned out that the job became nothing more than processing and releasing these people, that was very hard to take.”
Agents are diverted from their main job by other duties, he said.
“Even if my spidey senses go off, I have to ask myself, how much time can I devote to this?” said Clem. “Because I’ve got 200 more people in line I have to process. They even took away our ability to use DNA testing, so we no longer have the resources to see whether or not we’re processing a real family unit."
“A lot of agents are just trying to go to work and survive,” Clem added. “And that’s not where you want to be when you’re in law enforcement.”
Former President Donald Trump has said border policy will change if he is elected president, according to ABC.
"On Day One of my new administration, I will seal the border, stop the invasion of people pouring through our border and send Joe Biden's illegal aliens back home where they belong," Trump said at a recent New Jersey rally. "They have got to be sent home."
