Letts: Sacrifices of Border Agents Go Ignored - It's Time for That to Stop
Three Customs and Border Protection agents were shot recently during a confrontation with suspected drug smugglers off the coast of Puerto Rico. One of the officers died.
The two smugglers were also shot during the Nov. 17 incident, and one died.
The sacrifice of the CBP agent who died should have been something that politicians praised, as would have happened if a service member or police officer had died in the line of duty.
The media and Democratic politicians are quick to criticize actions CBP agents take to protect our border, acting as if border protection is not needed. When praise is due, though, they look the other way.
This is what National Border Patrol Council vice president Art Del Cueto is saying about the media, CBP leadership and politicians.
“The problem is you have to really dig within the media and the news outlets in order to find out what happened or find out the story,” Del Cueto said in an Instagram post.
“It’s really ridiculous that you have to really dig for that story. An agent died. … But when you hear that agents have done something wrong, you have commissioners, you have chiefs, you have politicians, they line up and have press conferences so they can make the workers at CBP and [the Department of Homeland Security] look like villains.”
He is obviously frustrated by not just the lack of support CBP agents receive, but also the disinformation and outright lies that are spread about the agency, such as CBP agents supposedly whipping illegal immigrants crossing a river last year.
It is done because CBP agents do their job, and if it gets out how effective they are at keeping drugs and terrorists out of the country and stopping human traffickers, the American public would be more supportive of them.
“Border Patrol agents encountered 98 illegal migrants, a record high, whose names were on the terror watchlist at the southern border in fiscal year 2022,” the Daily Caller reported. And that is only from October 2021 to September 2022. There is still another month to go in the fiscal year, and the numbers are more than six times greater than the next closest year (FY 2021).
The CBP also seized record amounts of fentanyl and meth this year. The drugs were taken from members of the Mexican cartels and illegal immigrants. “In just five separate inspections ahead of Labor Day weekend, for example, officers seized 625,000 pills in Nogales, Arizona, which borders Sonora, Mexico,” according to Just the News.
But praise is not something the left wants directed at CBP agents. That would not aid the left in trying to weaken our security along the southern border.
This lack of support must be frustrating to agents who regularly risk their lives to do what has become a thankless job. It’s time for that to stop. We need to support CBP before we destroy the sovereignty of the U.S.
The views expressed in this opinion article are those of their author and are not necessarily either shared or endorsed by the owners of this website. If you are interested in contributing an Op-Ed to The Western Journal, you can learn about our submission guidelines and process here.
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