Border Patrol Chief Greg Bovino Allegedly Disparaged The Faith of Jewish DOJ Lawyer During Conference Call

AP Photo/Tom Baker

Border Patrol field leader Gregory Bovino allegedly disparaged the faith of a Jewish prosecutor with the Department of Justice in the days after Renee Good’s shooting death in Minneapolis.

The New York Times reported Saturday that Bovino was on a conference call with DOJ attorneys a day before six federal prosecutors resigned over the DOJ’s public relations bungling over Good’s death.

“According to several people with knowledge of the telephone conversation, which took place on Jan. 12, Mr. Bovino made derisive remarks about the faith of the U.S. attorney in Minnesota, Daniel N. Rosen,” the report said, continuing:

Mr. Rosen is an Orthodox Jew and observes Shabbat, a period of rest between Friday and Saturday nights that often includes refraining from using electronic devices.

Mr. Bovino, who has been the face of the Trump administration’s immigration crackdown, used the term “chosen people” in a mocking way, according to the people with knowledge of the call. He also asked, sarcastically, whether Mr. Rosen understood that Orthodox Jewish criminals don’t take weekends off, the people said.

Bovino was allegedly upset that Rosen had been unavailable to discuss the goings-on in Minnesota because of Shabbat observances.

Lawyers in the Minneapolis field office told The Times that Bovino’s comments left them “deeply unsettled.”

Bovino was reassigned out of Minneapolis shortly after the shooting death of Alex Pretti, whom Bovino scoffed at when he was referred to as a victim.

“The victims are the Border Patrol agents,” Bovino told CNN’s Dana Bash. “I’m not blaming the Border Patrol agents. The suspect put himself in that situation.”

DHS spokesperson Tricia McLaughlin told The Times, “Instead of focusing on gossip, why don’t you focus on something actually important like the victims of illegal alien crime or the criminals taken out of Minneapolis communities?”

Neither Bovino nor the DOJ responded to The Times’s requests for comment. Rosen declined to comment.

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