Commissioner hits out at ‘unacceptable and disappointing’ local Border Patrol retweets of Stephen Miller

West Texas CBP office has its Twitter account deactivated over ‘offensive’ tweets

The West Texas regional office of Customs and Border Patrol is facing an internal probe after its official Twitter account amplified homophobic and rightwing political content.

The @CBPWestTexas account liked and retweeted a series of posts made by Trump administration immigration hardliner Stephen Miller, and others critical of the Biden administration on Saturday.

The account also liked several tweets that used a homophobic slur to attack Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg.

In a statement to El Paso Matters, a Customs and Border Patrol spokesperson said the account would be deactivated and the incident had been referred to the Office of Professional Responsibility to investigate. 

“The tweets do not reflect the values of this administration and our work to rebuild a humane, orderly, and secure immigration system,” the spokesperson said.

Two posts by Mr Miller, a speechwriter and adviser to former president Donald Trump, were retweeted by the account on Saturday.

One claimed Joe Biden had “ended nearly 250 years of constitutional government”.

In another, Mr Miller wrote: “Violent criminals lay waste to our communities undisturbed while the immense power of the state is arrayed against those whose only crime is dissent. The law has been turned from a shield to protect the innocent into a sword to conquer them.”

Totally unacceptable and disappointing that any CBP Twitter account was used to R/T offensive, unauthorized content. We’ve removed the content and will deactivate the account. The Office of Professional Responsibility will investigate. This must not happen again. pic.twitter.com/O0Vwr3K7nI

— CBP Commissioner Chris Magnus (@CBPChrisMagnus) September 11, 2022

Customs and Border Patrol commissioner Chris Magnus confirmed the incident would be investigated.

“Totally unacceptable and disappointing that any CBP Twitter account was used to (retweet) offensive, unauthorised content,” he said.

“We’ve removed the content and will deactivate the account.”

On Saturday, it was revealed that Mr Miller had been subpoenaed as part of a broadening Department of Justice investigation into the January 6 riots.

Mr Miller was the chief architect of the former president’s immigration policies that forcibly separated undocumented migrant families, enacted a “Muslim ban”, and ended the path to citizenship for 11 million under the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) programme.

According to the Southern Poverty Law Centre, Mr Miller is an extremist who used “fearmongering and xenophobia” to demonise immigrants while promoting a white nationalist agenda.