Border Patrol Chief Patrol Agent Greg Bovino will retire at the end of March, concluding a nearly 30-year career with the agency.
Bovino, a CBP operations commander, is widely known for leading U.S. Customs and Border Protection teams in some of the largest immigration enforcement operations in the agency's history, according to the Department of Homeland Security.
Speaking to Breitbart Texas on Sunday, Bovino said he leaves the agency with a strong sense of pride.
"The greatest honor of my entire life was to work alongside Border Patrol agents on the border and in the interior of the United States in some of the most challenging conditions the agency has ever faced," Bovino said.
"Watching these agents out there giving it their all in some of the most dangerous of environments we have ever faced was humbling," he added.
Bovino became a leading public face of President Donald Trump's push to expand interior immigration enforcement, directing Border Patrol agents in sweeping operations conducted far from the southern border.
His leadership in major metropolitan enforcement efforts represented a departure from the agency's more traditional focus on border areas.
During those operations, Bovino also faced pushback from politicians and leaders in sanctuary cities who objected to federal agents operating in their jurisdictions.
Bovino maintained the operations would continue until the agency decided to move on to another location.
He often led enforcement sweeps and nighttime operations that resulted in thousands of illegal immigrant apprehensions in Los Angeles, Chicago, New Orleans, and Minneapolis, and Charlotte, North Carolina.
Many of those operations targeted gang members and criminal aliens, and some were met with protests that led to assaults on federal agents.
Agents under Bovino's command were reportedly attacked in Los Angeles, where activists hurled rocks and other projectiles. In some incidents, protesters allegedly used vehicles to try to block or strike federal agents.
In one case, an activist fired a handgun at agents after they rescued 14 children from marijuana cultivation sites in California last July.
At the time, Bovino told Breitbart Texas that protesters trying to block agents with their vehicles appeared to be organized but were misinformed about the legal consequences of interfering with federal officers.
Operations in Los Angeles last summer led to more than 5,000 illegal immigrant arrests.
Under Bovino's leadership, agents also used unconventional tactics. In one instance, Border Patrol agents concealed themselves inside a Penske cargo truck during an enforcement action at an unofficial day labor site known as Operation Trojan Horse.
Interior enforcement later moved to Chicago, where Operation Midway Blitz resulted in more than 3,000 illegal immigrant arrests over several months in northern Illinois, according to DHS.
Those inland efforts culminated in Minneapolis under Operation Metro Surge, which concluded in February.
The Department of Homeland Security later described Metro Surge as the largest interior mobilization of agents for immigration enforcement in the agency's history.
The operation was scaled back after Trump border czar Tom Homan took command following two federal agent-involved killings and announced a rapid drawdown.
Nicole Weatherholtz ✉
Nicole Weatherholtz, a Newsmax general assignment reporter covers news, politics, and culture. She is a National Newspaper Association award-winning journalist.
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