https://www.telegraph.co.uk/us/news/2026/01/22/gregory-bovino-trump-minneapolis-immigration-raid/
Chief border patrol agent ‘with $10,000 bounty on his head’ reinforces an image of militarised policing
Harriet BarberOn Tuesday, Gregory Bovino stood before reporters in Minneapolis, celebrating the scale of arrests carried out under his watch.
“Over the course of this administration, more than 10,000 criminal illegal aliens have been apprehended here in Minneapolis over the past year,” the border patrol commander said. “And in just the last six weeks, the last six weeks alone, during this most current surge, 3,000 arrests of some of the most dangerous offenders operating in Minneapolis have occurred.”
The following day, protesters pelted Mr Bovino with food as he moved through the city, an illustration of the fury his presence has provoked.
Minnesota is the latest flashpoint in Donald Trump’s national illegal migrant crackdown.
ICE and border patrol agents are regularly filmed hauling people from their vehicles, grabbing suspects at shopping malls and in car parks, and carrying out sudden raids.
On Monday, it was also revealed that the Pentagon had ordered about 1,500 troops to prepare for a possible deployment to the city.
The enforcement surge followed weeks of protests in the state after a 37-year-old woman, Renee Good, was killed by an immigration officer in early January. “It feels like our community is under siege by our own federal government,” said state Representative Michael Howard last week.
Mr Bovino was first placed in charge of large-scale immigration enforcement operations in June, when the Trump administration launched its initial blitz of Los Angeles.
The appointment marked a return to prominence for Mr Bovino, who just two years earlier had been relieved of command of the border patrol’s El Centro sector in California and encouraged to retire, according to the Associated Press.
Since June, Mr Bovino has led operations in Chicago, North Carolina, New Orleans, and most recently Minneapolis, deploying teams whose tactics have drawn repeated criticism from the Left.
Agents under his command have smashed car windows, forced open doors to homes, and carried out high-visibility arrests that critics say blur the line between law enforcement and intimidation. He now calls himself the border patrol’s “commander at large”.
Mr Bovino often appears at operations wearing tactical gear, with firearms slung across his body, reinforcing an image of militarised policing.
In October, in Chicago’s Little Village neighbourhood, he was filmed throwing a gas canister at demonstrators without issuing a verbal warning, an apparent violation of a judge’s temporary restraining order limiting the use of force.
Mr Bovino defended his own conduct saying he believed “all uses of force have been more than exemplary”.
He appears to relish his reputation as a “hard man”, posting videos of himself online set to rap music.
He has said he was inspired to join the border patrol after watching the film The Border as a child, starring Jack Nicholson and Harvey Keitel as agents. He has said he was angered by the movie’s portrayal of border officers as villains and resolved to do the opposite.
He has described his approach to enforcement as “turn and burn,” a phrase that has become shorthand among critics for fast-moving raids with little regard for community impact.
According to the Chicago Sun-Times, even in his previous roles Mr Bovino appeared to court attention, once inviting reporters to watch him breaststroke across a concrete irrigation canal in Southern California’s Imperial Valley, warning migrants that the currents were strong.
Meanwhile, a federal jury is currently considering whether a Chicago man’s Snapchat messages constituted a real murder-for-hire plot against Mr Bovino.
Juan Espinoza Martinez, 37, is accused of offering $2,000 in cash for information on Mr Bovino’s whereabouts and $10,000 “if you have him killed”.
Defence attorneys countered that Espinoza Martinez, a carpenter with little money in his bank account, was merely repeating rumours. They argued the messages amounted to “neighbourhood gossip,” not a real plan to harm anyone, the AP reported.
Mr Bovino has also been the subject of two court orders addressing racial profiling, both of which the administration has appealed, according to the AP.
One stemmed from raids he led in California’s San Joaquin Valley during the final month of Joe Biden’s presidency while the other related to operations in Los Angeles.
A court filing by those who sued Mr Bovino and the government said “masked federal agents brandishing weapons cannot command people going about their daily lives to stop and prove their lawful presence solely because of their skin colour, accent, where they happen to be, and the type of work they do”. Mr Bovino has denied allegations of profiling.
He has attributed his earlier removal from command in August 2023 to what he described as minor transgressions: an online profile photo of himself posing with an M4 assault rifle, social media posts deemed inappropriate by the Biden administration, and sworn congressional testimony he and other sector chiefs gave about conditions at the border during a record surge of migrants, according to the Associated Press.
More recently, Mr Bovino drew fresh scrutiny after being photographed wearing a trench coat while patrolling Minneapolis, an image that spread rapidly online, with some users comparing the outfit to uniforms worn by Nazi officers.
He has defended immigration officers’ tactics by saying they are “born of necessity” and “well-grounded in law”. “Everything we do is legal, ethical and moral,” he said on Tuesday.