Trump’s attempt to turn the Border Patrol into a ‘national police’ force shocks troops: So much for conservative ‘small government’

By  Chauncey DeVega

The authoritarian does not make idle threats. He makes promises and then follows through on them.

Three years into Donald Trump’s term, and with eight months to go until Election Day 2020, the gears of his cruel machine grind on. He and it will never be satisfied.

Trump’s proposed 2021 federal budget includes billions of dollars to expand his system of detention centers and concentration camps, build more of his wall along the U.S.-Mexico border, and deploy more ICE, Border Patrol and other paramilitary forces.

Last week, the Trump administration announced that elite Border Patrol units would be deployed to “sanctuary cities” such as Chicago, New York, Los Angeles, San Francisco and elsewhere, where they will be used to assist regular ICE agents.

This is the next stage in the Trump regime’s campaign of violence, threats, intimidation, harassment and brutality against nonwhite migrants, immigrants and refugees.

Jenn Budd, a former senior Border Patrol agent turned civil rights activist, recently shared this on Twitter:

[R]ecently spent some time talking privately with a former Washington DC CBP senior management official. This is what stuck with me: Border Patrol does not believe they are a civilian law enforcement agency. They believe they are kin to the Marine Corps.



They do not believe they are accountable to Congress, which is why they have no issues lying to them even while under oath. They believe they are only accountable to the President and even then, only to presidents like Trump.



Border Patrol believes it is not required to answer to local police, FBI, CIA or any other law enforcement agency. They claim to be the “premiere” law enforcement agency [sic], superior to all others. They say they will become a “national police force.” To be used by a president to enforce laws even among citizens.

Last year it was reported that Donald Trump’s ICE enforcers — a group that works in tandem with the Border Patrol — would soon be training in facilities designed to simulate the buildings they might encounter in American cities and towns, often hundreds of miles from the Mexican border.

Elite Border Patrol and ICE shock troops are trained in the tactics, strategies and weaponry used by special forces and other commandos. An ability to simulate raids and other operations in and against “sanctuary” cities enhances their capabilities.

It is important to make clear that “sanctuary city” is itself a misnomer. These are not hives of murderers, rapists and other evildoers — the people from Latin America who Trump and his minions describe, in classic eliminationist rhetoric, as “snakes,” “invaders” and vermin – but rather communities where local governments have decided not to cooperate with federal law enforcement in harassing residents.