Dear fellow Border Patrol agents,

While I have not served in over twenty-four years, I still remember what it was like to wear that green uniform. I can recall being proud to have survived my sexual assault hazing in the academy earning me a Fierce Five Percent badge and being strong enough to hike those mountains alone, tracking and apprehending large groups of thirty to hundred. I can still remember the feeling of finally apprehending that one guy in thousands that was a violent criminal, or rescuing a child.

There is still much for an honorable law enforcement agency to do out there even if much of what you apprehend are asylum seekers and not criminals. But unfortunately, you all have lost whatever honor ever existed in that agency.

Those of the Old Patrol (prior to 9/11) who stayed in service and became the managers of today's New Patrol and the leaders of the corrupt union have led you further down the path to authoritarianism and thuggery. We in the Old Patrol did not call asylum seekers “invaders” or ever consider attempting to hold them in custody simply for crossing illegally if they passed their inspections. That, after all is their right according to the law.

Do you remember the law? Can you remember your law classes from the academy? I imagine you don’t because I know they are still giving you all the answers to the multiple choice questions before you take the tests. It is why most of you still do not understand the difference between probable cause and reasonable suspicion. It is why most of you only know how to racially profile and believe the Constitution does not protect undocumented people where due process is concerned, when it literally does exactly that.

You are living in a bubble, ingesting Fox News and right-wing propaganda twenty-four seven. So much so, you do not even know your own history. You still celebrate the first Border Patrol agent, Jeff Milton, as if he was something to be admired. Let me tell you what your agency refuses to say: Border Patrol agent Milton’s real name is Jefferson Davis Milton. And since most of you just barely graduated from high school, let me enlighten you further: Jefferson Davis was the president of the confederacy. His father was John Milton, confederate officer and governor of Florida during the Civil War. Governor Milton and his family owned over fifty enslaved people. Your beloved Jeff Milton grew up a slave owner on a plantation. When his father killed himself over losing his slaves and the war, young Jeff moved with his sister to Texas to try and continue the system of slavery.

That is your hero. That is your heritage. That is the truth.

Given your history and that you are unaware of it as I was when I was an agent, it is not surprising to see you all repeat the racism and violence of your past. After all, if we do not know our history, the history of our agency, we are deemed to repeat it as the saying goes.

That is what you are doing today.

You all know, just as I know, that when we close the asylum system down, those migrants will then just cross illegally making them your problem. During Trump’s first administration and during Biden’s, you all bitched constantly about having to process so many asylum seekers. Yet, you stayed quiet when it was your union and your managers who were advocating for that closure. You said nothing when they were constantly repeating the lie that the border was open when it was not because you all were clearly apprehending tons of people that were crossing.

Today, you sit quietly as they claim the border is closed knowing that they have stopped counting the got aways simply because Trump is in office. You say nothing even when you know they cannot physically close the whole border. You do not object as agents round up anyone who is not white, to include even US citizens. You seem fine as the government sends military to do your job on the southern border, knowing full well that they do not know the areas or how to track and that this order is illegal as it violates posse comitatus.

You are silent as you hear people ask for your name and badge number not knowing you use a star number or call sign. You say nothing as your fellow agents lie about being assaulted to justify beating an old man for the crime of being a landscaper. You turn a blind eye when you know that the people you are arresting are being sent to other countries that will violate their human rights. You zip your lip when you know the horrible and inhumane conditions that you yourself are keeping them in. And you now insist on wearing masks to hide your identities when you threw temper tantrums about wearing them during Covid which killed fifteen of your fellow agents.

You know from your own training that you are flat out violating the US Constitution, US immigration and asylum law as well as international laws. You all know you have violated your oath to the US Constitution.

You are so weak and pathetic, you cannot even see it.

There is a reason why ideologies of hate and intolerance continue, a reason why people feel it is okay to open concentration camps and send people to torture prisons. It is because we failed to hold most of you Nazis accountable after your last hurrah. Yes, I called you Nazis, because that is what you are. Even if you are not engaging in the mass deportations, you are still responsible just as I was for the atrocities the agency committed. You do not have to be the one throwing the fist, shooting the gun, pushing them into inhumane conditions to be liable. You are part of the system, and therefore responsible for it.

You still have time; you can change your ways as I did, discover what Honor First really means. You can argue for security and a humane immigration system that will keep asylum seekers from overwhelming you so that you can find the criminals, but I know you won’t. Agents like me cannot get into the agency anymore. Agents with conscience, ethics and morals are no longer welcome. The agency is a cesspool of hatred, brutality, sexual abuse, corruption, coverups and politicization.

This will be your legacy.

I know this because I see the shirts you are buying and selling. You never really cared about the US Constitution when you swore your allegiance. You lied because Honor First was and is always a lie.