On Tuesday, the House Judiciary GOP claimed a whistleblower alleged the Department of Homeland Security has informed U.S. Customs and Border Protection agents that they will be fired if they are not fully vaccinated by November.
“#BREAKING: Whistleblower alleges that Border Patrol agents have been given official notice that they must be fully vaccinated by November 2021 or face termination,” the Republicans tweeted.
In the letter, signed by Reps. Jim Jordan and Tom McClintock, the group slams President Joe Biden for the border crisis that they say was the result of Biden’s “radical immigration policies.”
“The Biden border crisis continues to worsen as illegal aliens stream across the southwest border as a result of President Biden’s and your radical immigration policies. As the brave men and women of U.S. Border Patrol work tirelessly to respond to the Administration’s manufactured border crisis, we have learned that the Department of Homeland Security has threatened to fire Border Patrol officials who refuse to comply with President Biden’s vaccine mandate,” the letter stated. “Your failure to support these federal law-enforcement officials will only make the Biden border crisis worse and make our country less secure.”
The congressmen accused the Biden administration of being “derelict” in its duty to secure the southern border of the United States. The letter highlighted that more than 1 million illegal immigrants have crossed the U.S.-Mexico border since January.
“Recently, the Biden Administration allowed more than 14,000 illegal aliens to congregate under a bridge in Del Rio, Texas in just a few days. Although news reports state the Administration was caught off-guard by this situation, House Republicans have been warning of a situation like this for months,” the letter continued. “The Biden Administration has stubbornly refused to address the crisis, allowing more and more illegal aliens to pour into our country and creating an unsustainable, humanitarian crisis.”
The letter noted that recruitment and retainment for U.S. Border Patrol has been difficult for years, with job locations typically remote and conditions “often dangerous and hard.”
“Their job is made even harder when senior officials, including Vice President Kamala Harris, spread false accusations of cruelty—as has occurred in recent days to mounted officers in Del Rio—while ignoring reports of attacks against Border Patrol personnel,” they said. “Citing the misinformation about cruelty, President Biden even vowed the Border Patrol officers ‘will pay’ This Administration is now openly targeting the heroic men and women of U.S. Border Patrol.”
The GOP reps warned that enforcing Biden’s vaccine mandate would risk “reducing the already depleted Border Patrol workforce in the middle of the unfolding border crisis.”
“It is simply unbelievable that the Biden Administration will allow COVID-positive illegal aliens to surge across the border but will terminate dedicated law-enforcement officers who do not comply with President Biden’s mandate,” they concluded. “We hope that for the safety of our country that you see the error in this decision, choose to support the heroes of CBP who put their lives on the line every day, and find reasonable accommodations for CBP officers who do not choose to comply with this mandate for personal or medical reasons.”
