Ex-border patrol chief defends his record after exit: ‘I wish I’d caught more illegal aliens’

Greg Bovino says Trump’s immigration crackdown hasn’t gone far enough in exit interview with the New York Times As his retirement looms, Gregory Bovino, the US border patrol’s former commander-at-large, has contended that efforts to curb illegal immigration by Donald Trump’s administration have not gone far enough – showing no remorse over federal agents’ killings of two US citizens in Minneapolis in January. “I wish I’d caught even more illegal aliens,” he told the New York Times on Tuesday in an exit interview, during which he also referred to the Republican president as “the Trumpster” and acknowledged his retirement at the end of March was not entirely voluntary. “We went as hard as we could, but there’s always a creative and innovative solution to catching even more.” Bovino announced his retirement from the patrol earlier in March. He had spent most of his 30-year career in California’s El Centro sector before being tapped by the Trump administration to lead its sweeping Operation Metro Surge in Minnesota. Trump then demoted Bovino after federal agents fatally shot 37-year-old US citizens Alex Pretti and Renee Good in separate encounters in Janua