ABOUT FAITH & FREEDOM

Thursday, June 16, 2022

The "Whipping" at the Border

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Remember when the pictures appeared last fall of Border Patrol agents "whipping" migrants illegally entering the United States?

It was so "distasteful" that before any investigation had begun President Biden promised they would pay for their behavior.

As it turned out, more pictures and the voluntary accounts of people who were actually at the border that day show conclusively that the Border Patrol wasn't "whipping" anyone.

They were simply doing their job by trying to turn back illegals flooding across the Rio Grande.

There is a whipping at the border, but it's the Biden administration doing the whipping.

Be informed, not misled.

The whipping incident.



On September 24, 2021 "Insider" published an article joining in the chorus against the Border Patrol.

The article said, "President Joe Biden said Border Patrol agents who whipped at Haitian migrants with horse reins as they attempted to cross the Rio Grande in Del Rio, Texas this week will face punishment for their 'outrageous' actions."

President Biden immediately reacted publicly with: "I promise you those people will pay. There will be consequences ... 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."

White House press secretary at the time, Jen Psaki, repeatedly called the images and footage "horrific" and "horrible." The Department of Homeland Security announced that it opened an investigation into the agents' actions. 

"Insider noted that DHS also jumped into the fray: "The footage is extremely troubling, and the facts learned from the full investigation, which will be conducted swiftly, will define the appropriate disciplinary actions to be taken."  

The problem with the "whipping."



After all the far-left, open border politicians and journalists had weighed in, the photographer who took the photo actually weighed in.

The photographer who captured photos that some said showed Border Patrol agents “whipping” Haitian migrants said he never actually saw agents “whipping” migrants and that his photos are being misinterpreted. 

Photographer Paul Ratje, who captured the shot, told local television KTSM that he "did not capture a migrant being whipped." The photographer said, "neither he nor his colleagues saw the agents whip anyone and the photos have been misinterpreted."

Fast forward to yesterday--- June 15, 2022.

Fox News reported that "The Department of Homeland Security is preparing to discipline multiple horseback Border Patrol agents involved in the infamous 'whipping' of Haitian migrants at the US--Mexico border in September."

A federal source has told Fox that a public announcement is expected in the next few days.

The source said that DHS will be putting forth proposals to discipline the agents who will have a chance to respond to the charges. Fox says they were told the charges are "administrative violations and do not amount to criminal conduct---of which the agents have been cleared."

In an interview with The Daily Caller, the president of the Border Patrol union chapter in the Del Rio sector slammed the Biden administration after reports indicating that they found wrongdoing by the agents accused of "whipping" migrants.

National Border Patrol Council President for the Del Rio border sector, Jon Anfinsen, told the Caller: "From the beginning, they had been convicted by the White House and DHS, so we figured something was coming."

Fox noted that "ABC, CBS, and NBC pushed the debunked claim that Border Patrol agents were whipping Haitian migrants, but didn't bother to inform viewers that it was discredited."

Takeaway

Jarrett Stepman, writing for the Daily Signal said:

Following the release of the pictures, the Biden administration went into full-on disinformation mode with the help of their media allies.

“To see people treated like they did, horses barely running over, people being strapped,” Biden said of Border Patrol agents. “It’s outrageous. I promise you those people will pay. There will be an investigation underway now, and there will be consequences. There will be consequences.”

There certainly were consequences for the Border Patrol agents who were there at the border doing their jobs. The administration suspended the use of horses, which have been used in border enforcement for most of the last century.

Horses perform particularly well in the particular conditions of the Southern border, according to the Border Patrol Museum. They are more useful off-road and do less damage to the environment.

With less environmental impact and reduced carbon emissions, you’d think the left would be all for it. But that’s not how this works.

Instead of fixing their failed policies and protecting their employees who’ve been utterly besieged, Biden and friends went into overdrive to promote the Narrative. The narrative in this case is that Border Patrol is mistreating migrants at the border, and that perhaps even border enforcement itself has sinister, racist implications.

Remember, this is the same administration that shamelessly called voter-reform laws in various states' 21st century “Jim Crow.” They quickly jumped to drawing comparisons between Border Patrol and slavery.

“Human beings should not be treated that way,” Vice President Kamala Harris said of the migrants in an interview with The View. “It also invoked images of some of the worst moments of our history, where that kind of behavior has been used against the Indigenous people of our country. It has been used against African Americans during times of slavery.”

Stepman concluded: "How predictable. Is there anything the administration doesn’t like that they won’t compare to slavery, segregation, or Nazis?"

When confronted with the mounting evidence that initial impressions of the Border Patrol photos were wrong, the administration has basically taken the line that it doesn’t matter.

When White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki was asked in a press conference if the now overwhelming evidence that Border Patrol agents were not using whips and were not using reins as whips would change anything about their response, she said: “Our reaction to the photos has not changed.”

Clearly, there is whipping going on at the border. Border Patrol agents are being whipped for doing their job to the best of their ability given the complete lack of support from the president.

And the American people are being whipped and abused by incoherent policies, including those related to our borders.

Sadly, many of the people being drawn to our borders by these same policies are often paying the price by being raped, robbed, exploited, and sometimes killed by the false promises made by the traffickers who take their money and their daughters.

Be Informed. Be Discerning. Be Vigilant. Be Engaged. Be Prayerful.