Mexican Authorities Attack U.S. Border Patrol Officers
As recently as last October 24, Mexican authorities were reported to have fired upon United States Border Patrol officers. That in itself is not uncommon.
The following is the transcript of an interview conducted on the Fox News Channels The OReilly Factor. The guest being interviewed is National Border Patrol Council President, T.J. Bonner.
O'REILLY: In the "Back of the Book" segment tonight: THE FACTOR continues its investigation of violence along the Mexican border. We've already documented two occasions where Mexican authorities shot at American federal agents. In the first incident, Mexican troops actually crashed through a fence in Texas, came on to American soil and shot at two border agents who were on horseback. Now comes word that in California more shots have been fired at American agents, and the story is being kept under wraps.
Joining us now from San Diego is the president of the National Border Patrol Council, T.J. Bonner. So tell us, Mr. Bonner, what happened?
T.J. BONNER, PRESIDENT, NATIONAL BORDER PATROL COUNCIL: On October 24, at just after noon, a U.S. Border Patrol helicopter clearly marked dropped off two agents close to the border, obviously on our side of the border. Shortly after that, these agents came under fire; at least eight shots were fired at them by 10 Mexican military troops. The agents clearly identified themselves as Border Patrol agents and told the troops that they were in the United States. The troops nonetheless advanced into the United States, telling the agents to come out of the brush. The agents again identified themselves, told the Mexican troops that they were in the United States and they needed to go back to Mexico. When reinforcements started to arrive from the Border Patrol, the Mexican military got into a minivan; at least some of them did, and drove off.
O'REILLY: All right, so how many shots were fired at the U.S. agents?
BONNER: At least eight.
O'REILLY: And nobody was hurt, obviously, right?
BONNER: No, nobody was hurt, thank God.
O'REILLY: OK, investigation, subsequent investigation revealed what?
BONNER: Well, the U.S. Border Patrol claims they did an investigation, although we have it on good authority that there never was an investigation, that the matter was just swept under the carpet.
O'REILLY: So this is the this is what happens on most of these things, they don't want any international incidents, so when this stuff happens, they just let it go, right?
BONNER: Right.
O'REILLY: Is that orders from the Justice Department?
BONNER: I'm not sure where it's coming from. It could be Justice. It could be State. It could be coming from as high as the White House.
O'REILLY: Now, the two guys who were are they angry, the two guys who were in the brush getting shot at by the Mexican troops?
BONNER: They're not the only ones who are angry. All Border Patrol agents are angry, we're angry with the Mexican government for allowing this to happen, for letting their troops take potshots at our agents. We're angry with the U.S. government for trying to sweep this under the carpet.
O'REILLY: Now, when you hear about reports like this, what do you, yourself, do as a president of the union? What do you do?
BONNER: Well, in the last incident, the one in New Mexico, we wrote to just about everybody that we could think of asking for a full and complete investigation. We got back a letter from the president of the United States that addressed some water boundary issue; it wasn't even the right issue. We got back a letter from the head of the Immigration and Naturalization Service, the commissioner, responding on behalf of the attorney general some four months after the fact telling us that it was all right, that this would never happen again, and here we are. It happened again.
O'REILLY: All right, so basically, the situation we have down there from Brownsville to San Diego is you have U.S. Border Patrol agents on our side being shot at by Mexican military. Now, we've heard accusations that the military assists drug runners across the border and, you know, is actively involved in the smuggling of narcotics into the United States. Do you believe that this was what this was about in this incident?
BONNER: It's hard to say, because we'll never know. Mexico denies that their troops shot at our people. Moreover, amazingly, the U.S. Border Patrol says that the reason they dropped the investigation is that the question of he said/she said. However, we have four U.S. Border Patrol agents swearing that these are the facts. Then we have Mexico denying. Somehow, in their eyes, this makes for a he said/she said. We can't sort this out.
O'REILLY: Well, I know who I believe, Mr. Bonner. In addition, I think know who the millions of people watching THE FACTOR right now believe. They believe the border agents. We know this is going on. You know the tragedy of this: The elite media won't report on it. You didn't get any national publicity on this at all, did you?
BONNER: No, we didn't.
O'REILLY: Well, it's a shame. Now, you let us know when this happens again, or what you investigate it yourself. You let us know every step of the way what happens, and we'll report it to the folks. OK?
BONNER: Great. I appreciate it.
O'REILLY: All right, Mr. Bonner. We'll do everything we can to help you guys out down there.