Readers React: Abolishing the Border Patrol would be disastrous, says U.S. Customs and Border Protection’s founding commissioner

To the editor: Richard Parker displays a misunderstanding of U.S. Customs and Border Protection.

Before the homeland security reorganization in 2003, the job of managing and controlling the borders of U.S. was fragmented between four separate agencies. CBP now includes all frontline customs, immigration and agriculture protection functions at our country’s 300-plus ports of entry, as well as the Border Patrol.

The Border Patrol was not given a new name, as Parker says; rather, it became one of three operational components of CBP.

Hardly “bloated,” the roughly 20,000 Border Patrol agents currently serving are responsible for our nation’s 6,000 miles of land border and several thousand miles of coastal waters. For comparison, the New York Police Department has 35,000 officers.

Parker cites a total of 13 Border Patrol agent prosecutions in the last couple of years and leaps to the conclusion that the agency is “permeated by corruption.” In any large law enforcement organization, there are going to be a few bad apples. CBP’s Office of Professional Responsibility is doing a good job at holding those who tarnish the badge accountable.

Parker claims Border Patrol agents have killed “nearly 100 people” in the last 15 years. Any deaths are lamentable, but due largely to better training and tactics, the use of lethal force by Border Patrol agents has fallen over the last five years.

Parker fails to show the Border Patrol is overstaffed or corrupt. His suggestion that it be abolished or downsized is not justified and it would only open our border to more illegal crossings.

Robert C. Bonner, Pasadena

The writer was the first commissioner of U.S. Customs and Border Protection.

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