Border Patrol has thousands of openings it can't fill

April 16, 2018

President Donald Trump is deploying the National Guard to patrol the border and hopes to get Congress to fund thousands more Border Patrol agents. But there are already thousands of those jobs unfilled. According to Customs and Border Protection, as of March 17, there were 19,346 Border Patrol agents on duty, short of the congressionally mandated 21,370. That's almost 100 fewer agents than there were at the end of September 2017. The agency's website is full of postings for career fairs as it tries to fill its ranks. The 2018 government spending bill said that CBP expects to lose more agents than it will hire this year, and accounted for that in its funding. Congressional appropriators also noted that the agency's request for more Border Patrol agents "was not supported by any analysis of workload and capability gaps" that would allow them to assess whether the agents were even necessary. Border crossings were at historic lows last year, though they have rebounded somewhat.
In fact, Customs and Border Protection has been struggling for years to even keep up with the rate of agents quitting or retiring, let alone hire the thousands more Trump has called for.

In a memo asking for more hiring authorities obtained by CNN last year, now-Commissioner Kevin McAleenan laid out the difficulties of hiring, concluding that optimistic estimates show it would still take five to 10 years to hire the 5,000 additional agents Trump has sought. In that memo, McAleenan said attrition was 6% a year, meaning it would take 2,729 border patrol agents being hired annually to reach just full staffing in five years. A 2010 anti-corruption bill passed by Congress required polygraph tests for all agents, concerned about the possibility they could be blackmailed, bribed or compromised by gangs, cartels or criminals. Lawmakers have proposed legislation that would relax the system only somewhat, waiving the polygraph for certain veterans and former security clearance holders. The agency also struggles to compete with federal law enforcement agencies for talent. Many of the assignments are in small towns or isolated regions along the US border, and job demands can be strenuous and dangerous.

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Rogue Valley said:

Border Patrol has thousands of openings it can't fill

Seems to me Trumps order sending in 4,000 NG troops is due [to a great extent] to 2,024 unfilled CBP positions.

Rather than address this CBP staffing problem, Trump just throws more taxpayer money at it and takes a perfunctory bow. Window dressing.

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WCH said:

It's hard to believe that in those economically impoverished areas along the borders that one wouldn't jump at a chance for a potentially well-paying job with excellent benefits and retirement.

FWIW, the Guardsmen and women will be doing on-the-job, government funded training while on duty along the border. The monies won't be wasted.

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Objective Voice said:

Actually, it is a waste of taxpayer funds. Real, permanent Border Patrol agents could be hired and trained to do this job 24/7 instead of some part-time National Guardsman who'll collect his 6-month paycheck and go home when his tour is done. What problem does that solve? Unless they're part of a larger "construction operations" masquerading as a "national security" front, this solves nothing in the long term. Unless and until real immigration reform is put on the President's desk that includes funding Border Agents, the next POTUS will be dealing with this same problem just as his last THREE predecessors.

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WCH said:

What do you consider "real" reform?

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Objective Voice said:

1. Approve DACA for starters. The only reason Republicans balk on this issue is because they don't want to be run out of Congress for providing "amnesty" to Mexicans and/or Hispanics for the 3rd time under either a Republican president (Reagan and GHW Bush being the first 2) or a Republican-controlled Congress.

2. Fund border security. It starts with having boots on the ground covering as much terrain as possible. Right now, our Border Patrol is woefully under funded and under staffed.

3. Improve border surveillance using modern technology, i.e., night-vision cameras, motion sensors with early detection warning alarms, drones, permanent wall units in those areas along the southern border that are difficult to patrol either by foot or by boat.

4. Hire more USCIS agents to process immigration applications and other paperwork to reduce wait time on application review/approvals. This department is also woefully under staffed.

5. Change how immigrants are monitored. Each foreigner who applies for a tourist, student or employment VISA should have a sponsor. If you're here to tour the U.S., you should have a tour guide assigned from the agency providing the "tour". If you're here for college, maybe the Dean of Students should be your sponsor or some other school official. If you're here for employment, your employer should be your sponsor. We're too lose with this! These migrants get lost in the shuffle mainly because no one's watching them other than the FBI/ICE and by then it's usually too late; a crime (there than overstaying your stay) has already been committed.

6. Penalize those sponsors who fail to keep track of their "pledges".

7. Provide a time frame whereby ALL ILLEGAL ALIENS can come out from the shadows and apply for U.S. citizenship or face deportation. Safe-harbor registration is a must! Any foreigner caught in the U.S. after this open-registration period has lapsed who has failed to register will be arrested and deported.

Seven quick, simple points that get the job done!!

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Rogue Valley said:

Border Patrol has thousands of openings it can't fill

Seems to me Trumps order sending in 4,000 NG troops is due [to a great extent] to 2,024 unfilled CBP positions.

Rather than address this CBP staffing problem, Trump just throws more taxpayer money at it and takes a perfunctory bow. Window dressing.

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President Obama will deploy 1,200 National Guard troops and request an extra $500 million to secure the Mexican border, his administration said Tuesday, a move dismissed by Republicans as insufficient to win their cooperation on an overhaul of the nation's immigration system.

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By reinforcing the 340 Guard members already monitoring border crossings and analyzing intelligence, the initiative echoes 2006's Operation Jump Start, in which President George W. Bush devoted 6,000 guardsmen to a two-year commitment in support of the Border Patrol.

Then, as now, the troop deployment was fueled by heightened concerns about lawlessness -- then it was illegal immigration, now it is drug traffickers -- as well as political maneuvering in Washington to lay the groundwork for an effort to change immigration policy. But the issue remains bitterly contentious, with increasing pressure on Obama and lawmakers from both Latino supporters and conservative activists.

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Rogue Valley said:

Border Patrol has thousands of openings it can't fill

Seems to me Trumps order sending in 4,000 NG troops is due [to a great extent] to 2,024 unfilled CBP positions.

Rather than address this CBP staffing problem, Trump just throws more taxpayer money at it and takes a perfunctory bow. Window dressing.

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WCH said:

I agree with most of those. When do we get started with the deportations and holding those responsible to task?

BTW: I was on the border in Nov. and we didn't see a whole lot of surveillance.

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Rich2018 said:

Scrapping border control check points INSIDE the USA would save a lot of money.


Has anyone driven through one and been snapped at by a Border Control Agent demanding to know if you're a citizen ?

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