Border Patrol halts tweets from agency’s West Texas region
Sep 11, 2022, 11:17 AM | Updated: 11:48 am
EL PASO, Texas (AP) — U.S. Customs and Border Protection has deactivated the agency’s Twitter account for the West Texas region after it retweeted posts criticizing President Joe Biden’s border policies and liked posts that made gay slurs against U.S. Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg.
CBP Commissioner Chris Magnus posted a tweet late Saturday saying the agency “has become aware of unauthorized and inappropriate content” that was posted on the @CBPWestTexas Twitter account.
The agency’s Office of Professional Responsibility will investigate, Magnus said.
“This must not happen again,” his statement said.
On Saturday, the account retweeted posts by Stephen Miller that criticized Biden’s immigration policies and claimed the government was ignoring violent crime. Miller was the architect of former President Donald Trump’s hard-line immigration policies.
“The tweets do not reflect the values of this administration and our work to rebuild a humane, orderly and secure immigration system,” Magnus said in a statement.
A human rights advocate and a former immigration attorney posted tweets Saturday noting the account had retweeted Miller’s criticisms and then looked back and found other posts the account had liked.
In October 2021, it was announced that 60 Border Patrol agents had committed misconduct by participating in a private Facebook group that mocked migrants and lawmakers. Customs and Border Protection’s Discipline Review Board recommended that 24 of the agents be fired, but only two were.
The existence of the Facebook page, which had about 9,500 members, was reported in July 2019.
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