Last week, Border Patrol Chief Raul Ortiz (pictured) announced that he will retire effective June 30th. The record number of illegal aliens flooding into the country under his watch and his unpopularity among the force are believed to be the reasons for his departure. Many agents have called him "a joke."
Ira Mehlman, a spokesman for the Federation for American Immigration Reform (FAIR), says Ortiz has been a tool of the Biden administration's open-borders policies.
"Rather than stand up for the principle of what the Border Patrol needs to be doing and standing up to the administration when they try to prevent them from doing their jobs in protecting the country, he has kind of gone along with it, except when he has been under oath under several occasions," Mehlman notes. "Those times, he actually told the truth -- that the border is out of control."
Still, that admission never led to any action.
"He failed to stand up to the administration and say the border is out of the control and we need to do something about it," the FAIR spokesman continues. "He has simply gone along. He is a political appointee, and he has toed the administration's line, which is keep the border wide open."
That is why Mehlman is not confident that Ortiz' replacement will be much of an improvement.
"I would be surprised if they appointed somebody who was in the job to try to do what is necessary to protect the border," he tells AFN.
But he "wouldn't bet the mortgage money" on seeing that happen.
