Officials at Customs and Border Protection reportedly have known for as long as three years of a private Facebook group where current and former Border Patrol agents would post lewd and derogatory content mocking illegal immigrants and members of Congress.
A current official at the Department of Homeland Security told Politico that agents made CBP leadership aware of the offensive posts by the group as early as 2016.
Members of the group — named “I’m 10-15,” which is code for “aliens in custody” — would post offensive content such as questioning the legitimacy of the photos of a drowned father and daughter attempting to cross the Rio Grande, mocking the death of a 16-year-old detained migrant, and remarks of throwing burritos at Latina congresswomen, including Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, ProPublica reported Monday.
The Facebook group is “secret,” meaning it’s not visible to those who haven’t been admitted to join.
But a former DHS official told Politico he knew of the group in the past year and that it was monitored by CBP personnel “as a source of intelligence” to see “what people are talking about.”
“We were not talking about ’10-15’ as a liability or an asset or as an item of concern,” the former official said.
Those claims contradict statements by Border Patrol Chief Carla Provost and acting DHS Secretary Kevin McAleenan, who denounced the posts after the ProPublica report.
“Reporting this week highlighted disturbing & inexcusable social media activity that allegedly includes active Border Patrol personnel,” Mr. McAleenan tweeted. These statements are completely unacceptable, especially if made by those sworn to uphold the @DHSgov mission, our values & standards of conduct.”
Ms. Ocasio-Cortez responded to the Politico report, saying CBP “lied” to her by saying they had just discovered the group.
“When members of Congress asked CBP if they knew about violently racist & sexually disturbing secret Facebook group w up to 10,000 CBP officers, they told us they just learned about it,” she tweeted. “Looks like CBP lied. Reporting shows they knew about it for *years.* This is a big deal.”
The Politico report comes amid the discovery of another secret Facebook group with alleged ties to CBP and similarly vulgar and sexual posts.
• Bailey Vogt can be reached at bvogt@washingtontimes.com.
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