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In September 2021, a media storm was created over an image of Border Patrol agents on horseback, “whipping” migrants. They were exonerated last week of charges, and now they could sue for defamation and denial of due process.
An investigation by Customs and Border Protection’s Office of Professional Responsibility concluded that was “no evidence” that “any agents struck–intentionally or otherwise–any migrants with their reins.”
Just The News reported:
Despite the finding by their agency, four Border Patrol agents are still being suspended.
“There are two different potential areas for litigation,” Turley told Just the News on Wednesday. “First, the agents can appeal the findings and seek other relief for a denial of due process. Second there are possible defamation claims against various public figures and press for the false claims. The videotape undermines the good-faith basis for the claims, particularly after the first 24 hours. However, many states have redaction statutes requiring notice to newspapers and media to allow for corrections.”
The investigation into the agents was “not about protecting migrants,” Turley wrote in his column in The Hill Friday. “It is about protecting a president.”
The Border Patrol agents’ union chief went on Fox News earlier this week to respond to the situation. Border Patrol doesn’t “have the resources right now to do what’s necessary to secure the border, to protect the American public,” said National Border Patrol Council President Brandon Judd.
“And now we’re taking several agents out of the field on suspension for doing absolutely nothing wrong.”
“And yet, this administration is looking to scapegoat them because President Biden was wrong,” he continued. “He was wrong when he accused them of a criminal act, so they had to trump something up — which was an administrative violation — to put them on suspension. It’s wrong to see that that’s happening in this country. It should never happen in the greatest country in the world.”
Judd told Fox News he had spoken with two of the Border Patrol agents cleared. He said they were “in good spirits” because “they know that, ultimately, they’re gonna be exonerated. They know that my attorneys are ultimately gonna be able to show that they did absolutely nothing wrong, whether it was criminal or policy.”
The “investigation should’ve ended the moment they determined that nobody was struck by anything,” Judd said, but “the president of the United States said that these individuals would pay, and the moment he said that, those investigators had no choice but to find some sort of fault — whether it was criminal or administrative.”
Biden and many administration officials were very quick to condemn the agents after photos were misconstrued as showing them whipping Haitian migrants.
Biden said the agents “would pay” and vowed that “there will be consequences.” He said the situation was “beyond an embarrassment, it’s dangerous; it’s wrong. It sends the wrong message around the world. It sends the wrong message at home. It’s simply not who we are.”
