The Dictatorship
Greg Bovino was the hero of his own movie
With his heavily gelled buzz cut and his willingness to use violence against peaceful protestors, Border Patrol chief Gregory Bovinothe public face of President Donald Trump’s deportation spree and a so-called commander at large, seemed straight out of central casting. His aggressive tactics and flair for the dramatic made Bovino the perfect avatar for an immigration policy designed to prioritize spreading fear and pain over accuracy and efficiency.
Neither courtroom condemnations nor public backlash seemed to dampen his zeal for transforming the pain of immigrants caught up in federal sweeps into viral content. Bovino, whose career path was inspired by a 1980s Jack Nicholson movieseemed to relish the opportunity Trump’s deportation ramp-up gave him to play the main character.
Bovino, whose career path was inspired by a 1980s Jack Nicholson movie, seemed to relish the opportunity Trump’s deportation ramp-up gave him to play the main character.
When a federal officer shot and killed Renee Good in her SUV in Minneapolis this month, Bovino continued to encourage his agents’ confrontations with demonstrators and observers. Only when a Border Patrol agent under his command fired his gun into Alex Pretti was Bovino hustled out of Minnesota and back to his base in southern California.
Bovino being sent away was a begrudging acknowledgment from the Trump administration that it’s losing the public relations war. But it’s inaccurate to say he was “demoted” from the role as “commander at large” because that position doesn’t officially exist. More importantly, it’s likely that the forces he marshaled in the field will march on without him.
Bovino’s visibility increased exponentially after the White House became frustrated that Immigration and Customs Enforcement, which has traditionally run targeted operations to detain individuals and not indiscriminate dragnets, wasn’t even getting halfway to deputy chief of staff Stephen Miller’s goal for 3,000 arrests per day.
As ICE fell in standing, Border Patrol rose in its place. The Atlantic’s Nick Miroff pointed out last year that “Trump’s militarized border crackdown and ban on asylum seekers have reduced illegal crossings to the lowest levels since the 1960s, leaving Border Patrol agents with more time on their hands.” That extra time has been spent acting as added muscle during immigration raids, leading them to be as visible as ICE — if not more so — during Trump’s deportation campaign.
And there at the forefront was Bovino, who joined CBP in 1996 and rose through the ranks to become chief of the patrol’s El Centro sector. When he was a child, Bovino told The New York Times that his parents took him to see “The Border,” starring Nicholson and Harvey Keitel. The film and the books he later consumed painted a picture of “a pretty tough organization to be out there alone with no backup,” he told the Times. “And I began to realize that that thing called the US Border Patrol is probably something pretty special.”
The corruption and lack of morality on display from most of the officers in “The Border” appear not to have bothered him. He instead seemed to internalize the idea that an agent needs to subvert bureaucracy and act on instinct against the evildoers of the world, a view that doesn’t translate into effective law enforcement.
Upon becoming sector chief in 2020, The Atlantic reportedBovino harnessed his love of the dramatic and “became the lead auteur of a new style of highly produced videos for CBP.” According to an April 2025 report by the nonprofit newsroom CalMatterslast year, Bovino’s El Centro sector employed “five Border Patrol agents whose job it is to produce videos.”
Bovine”https://www.thetimes.com/us/american-politics/article/who-is-gregory-bovino-coat-border-patrol-j29xxmzmj?gaa_at=eafs&gaa_n=AWEtsqfNbwp9REBepWQAGSE-V1yzJzVRHepKOAiYfl1EgeJSBt5Xes5f9wN8oyGuRIU%3D&gaa_ts=697d4d81&gaa_sig=P2boAcJS1-_zAEy5wEf6pUXMUmujT6ewSfHWgyUYmJqrboSLnY5i6RHZnex4Ca95N61pGFMeBcVS7c0979ewdg%3D%3D”>reportedly bristled at policy shifts during the Biden administration that allowed an estimated 5.8 million migrants to either be granted parole or seek asylum between 2021 and 2024. In 2023, he briefly became the subject of a minor partisan firestorm when he was temporarily relieved of command and assigned a desk job in Washington. Bovino and congressional Republicans called it retaliation for his wanting to testify at a GOP-led hearing on President Joe Biden’s border policies. Or perhaps it had more to do with his social media footprintwhich included a profile picture of him in a black bulletproof vest brandishing an M4 assault rifle, looking every inch the image of a maverick willing to kick ass for his country.
The day after Trump’s win was certified last year, that is, still during the Biden administration, a team of Border Patrol agents traveled five hours north of El Centro to take part in a large-scale raid Bovino dubbed “Operation Return to Sender.” A federal judge later determined that the Kern County operation likely hinged on “stopping individuals without having a reasonable suspicion of illegal presence, as required by the Fourth Amendment.” CalMatters likewise reported: “Border Patrol officials misrepresented the very basics of their high-profile, large-scale immigration raid. Data obtained from U.S. Customs and Border Protection reveal that Border Patrol had no prior knowledge of criminal or immigration history for 77 of the 78 people arrested.”
When asked about “Operation Return to Sender,” which he carried out without approval from his superiors, Bovino was unrepentant. If his goal was to get the attention of the incoming administration, though, it worked like a charm. It’s unclear precisely when he came across the radar of Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem and Corey Lewandowskiher unofficial chief of staff, but she elevated Bovino to the head of the vanguard.
In a recently resurfaced video from June, after mass protests followed high-profile ICE raids in Los Angeles County, Bovino tells federal officers under his command: “Arrest as many people that touch you as you want to. Those are the general orders, all the way to the top.”
A subsequent ride through the city’s MacArthur Park on horseback as part of a show of force was met with anger and scorn from Angelenos. Bovino responded with a Kendrick Lamar-soundtracked hype video using footage of the operation. It was one of many such videos his office churned out from L.A. that framed Border Patrol and other law enforcement officials as action heroes battling chaos.
Los Angeles was the template for later deployments, sending Bovino traipsing across the country with overarching control of the stepped-up immigration operations. By late October, he had a new title to go along with his newly unfettered position. “Commander at large” is a role that doesn’t exist anywhere on paper, but it reportedly freed him from the chain of command and left him answerable only to Noem herself.
Bovino seemed to test that new authority in Chicago, where his willingness to escalate against protestors and his sworn testimony about his actions led to a sharp judicial rebuke. Video showed Bovino lobbing a canister of tear gas into a peaceful group of protesters, only for him to later claim that he did so in response to being hit with a rock.
During a deposition for a lawsuit that followed, Bovino acknowledged that he hadn’t been hit by a rock. During that same deposition, he declined to make any distinctions between lawful protesters and violent rioters. While imposing an injunction barring federal officers from using excessive force, U.S. District Court Judge Sara Ellis called Bovino’s “testimony not credible” and said in some of his testimony he was “outright lying.”
But as The Wall Street Journal reported in October, rather than leading Noem and Lewandowski to withdraw their support, Bovino’s tactics “earned plaudits from the pair, who have given him wide latitude to run his own operation.” By mid-November, he was spotted in North Carolina for the disgustingly titled “Operation Charlotte’s Web.” Quoting the classic children’s book, Bovino boasted, “We take to the breeze, we go as we please.” He proceeded to breeze back out of the state after only a week on the ground and roughly 450 arrestsa small amount given the magnitude of the disruption his agents caused.
His goal in New Orleans was 5,000 arrestsaccording to The Associated Press, but he was deployed to Minneapolis before he got anywhere near that goal.
He spent seven weeks on the ground in Minnesota, and not even an ICE officer killing Renee Good or Alex Pretti changed his tune. When BLN’s Dana Bash told Bovino that his remarks about Pretti “feel as though in some ways you’re blaming the victim here,” Bovino responded, “The victim? The victims are the Border Patrol agents.”
While his so-called turn and burn tactics won’t have his direct blessing, Border Patrol officers are still on the ground in Minneapolis
Two days later, Bovino was removed from his post and sent back to California. The role of “commander at large” now sits empty. His once frenetic social media feed has been quiet since Monday.
Jenn Budd, a former Border Patrol agent turned immigration activist, told The Times of London that in her research, Bovino popped up as “a little Napoleon who wants you to think that he is the most moral and capable guy in the world, and everything around you is dangerous but he’s the one who’s going to save you. It’s all a show for him.” Small wonder then that he was cast in the role he played so effectively for the Trump administration.
Meanwhile, Bovino’s removal from the field may have little immediate effect on how ongoing immigration operations play out. While his so-called turn and burn tactics won’t have his direct blessing, Border Patrol officers are still on the ground in Minneapolis. And there’s no reason to assume the violent raids and indiscriminate attacks on observers and demonstrators will end just because he’s gone.
Border Patrol has a mandatory retirement age of 57meaning Bovino doesn’t have long left as a member of the agency he’s idolized. When he finally hangs up his green uniform, whether that’s sooner or later, he’ll have a legacy that, for better or for worse, will endure.
Last year, the Trump administration overhauled ICE’s leadership to place current and retired Border Patrol officials in charge of field offices around the country. NBC News reported then that the changes were orchestrated by Le wandowski and Bovinowho worked together to draw up the list of ICE offices they believed were lagging.
When you boil down Bovino’s position as “commander at large,” it wasn’t about increasing the number of arrests; those are still far below Stephen Miller’s quotas. Nor was it about the number of dangerous individuals taken off the street, especially with an administration that falsely lumps together all undocumented immigrants as criminals. It was about content: Bovino’s specialty.
At the height of Operation Midway in Chicago, a massive force of more than 300 federal agents descended on an apartment building in the middle of the night. Agents rappelled down from a Black Hawk helicopter, dragging residents from their homes and into the streets. ProPublica reporting later showed that no federal criminal charges were filed against anyone arrested that night, nor were the government’s claims that the building was a hub of gang activity borne out. But the video the administration released of the raid had all the hallmarks of a leader whose inspiration to join Border Patrol was born at the movies.
Hayes Brown is a writer and editor for MS NOW Daily.
Rep. Eric Swalwell dropped out of the Democratic primary for California governor on Sunday night after detailed accusations of sexual assault and misconduct doomed his once successful campaign — and led his closest allies and aides to demand he bow out.
“I am suspending my campaign for Governor,” Swalwell said in a statement posted on social media.“To my family, staff, friends, and supporters, I am deeply sorry for mistakes in judgment I’ve made in my past. I will fight the serious, false allegations that have been made — but that’s my fight, not a campaign’s.”
The damning allegations brought by a former aide against the congressman sparked a criminal investigation in New York City and threatened the one-time presidential candidate’s political future.
By Sunday, several Democratic lawmakers — including fellow members of the California congressional delegation — had called on Swalwell to not just end his campaign for governor, but resign from Congress.
There must be accountability with both House Ethics and law enforcement about the sexual assault, and Eric Swalwell should resign.”
Rep. Ro Khanna, D-Calif.
“There must be accountability with both House Ethics and law enforcement about the sexual assault, and Eric Swalwell should resign,” Rep. Ro Khanna, D-Calif., said Sunday.
Several Democrats suggested they would support an expulsion effort if Republicans would take down one of their own: Rep. Tony Gonzalez of Texas, who is under a House ethics investigation for alleged sexual misconduct with an aide who died by suicide.
Rep. Anna Paulina Luna, a Florida Republican, announced her effort to push an expulsion resolution against Swalwell, saying, “I am not going to serve with these sexual deviants, that is not what Congress is about.”
Swalwell vehemently denied the accusationsfirst reported by the San Francisco Chronicle Friday, and disregarded calls from prominent California Democrats, including his two campaign co-chairs, Reps. Jimmy Gomez and Adam Gray, to drop out of the race.
“These allegations of sexual assault are flat false. They are absolutely false. They did not happen. They have never happened,” Swalwell said in a video address posted to social media after the reports were made public. “And I will fight them with everything that I have.”
House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries and former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, whose district spans much of San Francisco, called for Swalwell to relinquish the race while key backers withdrew their endorsements and his campaign effectively suspended its operations.
It was unclear which of the candidates in the crowded Democratic primary to succeed California Gov. Gavin Newsom, a term-limited Democrat who is seen as a 2028 presidential contender, would gain the backing of the Democratic establishment.
MS NOW spoke with the woman at the center of the allegations, a former Swalwell staff member, who confirmed that she made the sexual assault allegations first reported by the Chronicle and later by CNN, which citedthree other women alleging various kinds of sexual misconduct by Swalwell.
The main accuser, who has not been publicly identified and worked for Swalwell for nearly two years, said she had sexual encounters while he was her boss. She said he sexually assaulted her on two occasions when she was too intoxicated to consent, the Chronicle reported. The former aide confirmed to MS NOW that she made the sexual assault allegations.
Her former colleagues supported her and condemned Swalwell.
“We stand with our former colleague, and the other women who have come forward. We believe you should stand with them, too,” the California lawmaker’s gubernatorial and congressional staff wrote in a joint letter issued over the weekend. “The behavior detailed in these reports is abhorrent, beneath the dignity of those serving in public office and betrays the trust of all Californians.”
Sydney Carruth is a breaking news reporter covering national politics and policy for MS NOW. You can send her tips from a non-work device on Signal at SydneyCarruth.46 or follow her work on X and Bluesky.
The Dictatorship
Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán concedes defeat after ‘painful’ election result
BUDAPEST, Hungary (AP) — Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbánconceded defeat on Sunday after what he called a ″painful″ election resultending 16 years in power for a powerful figure in the far-right movement allied with U.S. President Donald Trump and Russian President Vladimir Putin.
Partial official results show opposition leader Peter Magyar’s party dominating the vote, in a bombshell election result with repercussions around Europe and beyond. ‘’Thank you, Hungary!” Magyar posted on X, as thousands of his supporters thronged the banks of the Danube in Budapest.
Across town, Orban told his followers that “I congratulated the victorious party.”
“We are going to serve the Hungarian nation and our homeland from opposition as well,” he said.
With 60% of the vote counted, Magyar’s Tisza party had more than 52% support to 38% for Orbán’s governing Fidesz party. That proportion will change as more votes are counted.
It’s a major blow for Orbán, the European Union’s longest-serving leader and one of its biggest antagonists, who has traveled a long road from his early days as a liberal, anti-Soviet firebrand to the Russia-friendly nationalist admired todayby the global far-right.
The parties of both Orbán and Magyar said they had received reports of electoral violations, suggesting some results could be disputed by both sides.
Voters showed up in droves
Turnout by 6:30 p.m. was over 77%, according to the National Election Office, a record number in any election in Hungary’s post-Communist history.
“I’m asking our supporters and all Hungarians: Let’s stay peaceful, cheerful, and if the results confirm our expectations, let’s throw a big, Hungarian carnival,” Magyar said.
Orbán’s chief of staff, Gergely Gulyás, said the record high turnout showed that “Hungarian democracy is extremely strong.”
‘Choice between East or West’
Orbán has repeatedly frustrated EU efforts to support Ukraine in its war against Russia’s full-scale invasion, while cultivating close ties to President Vladimir Putin and refusing to end Hungary’s dependence on Russian fossil fuel imports.
Recent revelations have shown a top member of his government frequently shared the contents of EU discussions with Moscow, raising accusations that Hungary was acting on Russia’s behalf within the bloc.
The election was closely watched in countries around Europeand beyond, which is a testament to the outsize role Orbán occupies in far-right populist politics worldwide.
Members of Trump’s “Make America Great Again” movement are among those who see Orbán’s government and his Fidesz political party as shining examplesof conservative, anti-globalist politics in action, while he is reviled by advocates of liberal democracyand the rule of law.
After casting his vote, Magyar told reporters that the election was “a choice between East or West, propaganda or honest public discourse, corruption or clean public life.”
Casting his ballot in Budapest, Marcell Mehringer, 21, said he was voting “primarily so that Hungary will finally be a so-called European country, and so that young people, and really everyone, will do their fundamental civic duty to unite this nation a bit and to break down these boundaries borne of hatred.”
Strained relationship with the EU
During his 16 years as prime minister, Orbán has launched harsh crackdowns on minority rightsand media freedomssubverted many of Hungary’s institutions and been accused of siphoning large sums of money into the coffers of his allied business elite, an allegation he denies.
He also has heavily strained Hungary’s relationship with the EU. Although Hungary is one of the smaller EU countries, with a population of 9.5 million, Orbán has repeatedly used his veto to block decisions that require unanimity.
Most recently, he blocked a 90-billion euro ($104 billion) EU loanto Ukraine, prompting his partners to accuse him of hijacking the critical aid.
Serious challenger on the rise
Magyar rapidly rose to become Orbán’s most serious challenger. The 45-year-old leader of the center-right Tisza party, which led in independent polls, campaigned on issues affecting ordinary voters including Hungary’s faltering public health care and transportation sectors and what he describes as rampant government corruption.
A former insider within Orbán’s Fidesz, Magyar broke with the party in 2024 and quickly formed Tisza. Since then, he has toured Hungary relentlessly, holding rallies in settlements big and smallin a campaign blitz that recently had him visiting up to six towns daily.
In an interview with The Associated Pressearlier this month, Magyar said the election will be a “referendum” on whether Hungary continues on its drift toward Russia under Orbán, or can retake its place among the democratic societies of Europe.
Tisza won 30% of the vote in European Parliament elections in 2024, and Magyar took a seat as an EU lawmaker. Tisza is a member of the European People’s Party, the mainstream, center-right political family with leaders governing 12 of the EU’s 27 nations.
Uphill election battle
Magyar and Tisza face a tough fight. Orbán’s control of Hungary’s public media, which he has transformed into a mouthpiece for his party, and vast swaths of the private media market give him an advantage in spreading his message.
The unilateral transformation of Hungary’s electoral system and gerrymandering of its 106 voting districts by Fidesz also will require Tisza to gain an estimated 5% more votes than Orbán’s party to achieve a simple majority.
Additionally, hundreds of thousands of ethnic Hungarians in neighboring countries had the right to vote in Hungarian elections and traditionally have voted overwhelmingly for Orbán’s party.
Fidesz and Tisza both have launched platforms for reporting irregularities, accusing their opponents of planning to commit election abuses.
Russian secret services have plotted to interfere and tip the election in Orbán’s favor, according to numerous media reports including by The Washington Post. The prime minister, however, has accused neighboring Ukraineas well as Hungary’s allies in the EU, of seeking to interfere in the vote to install a “pro-Ukraine” government.
Such accusations are part of why many in the EU see Orbán as a danger to the bloc’s future.
But across the Atlantic, Trump and his MAGA movement are all-in for another Orbán term. Trump has repeatedly endorsed the Hungarian leader and U.S. Vice President JD Vance made a two-day visit to Hungarylast week meant to help push Orbán over the finish line.
The walls are closing in around Rep. Eric Swalwell, D-Calif., who faces a criminal investigation into sexual assault allegations and mounting pressure — not just to abandon his campaign for California governor — but to resign from Congress.
Rep. Pramila Jayapal of Washington state, who has long advocated for survivors of Jeffrey Epstein, was one such Democrat on Sunday saying Swalwell should resign or be expelled.
When asked on NBC’s “Meet the Press” Sunday if she thinks Swalwell should abandon the race for governor, Jayapal said, “I absolutely do.”
She also said Swalwell should resign, along with Republican Rep. Tony Gonzalez of Texas, who is under a House ethics probe for a sexual relationship he admitted to having with an aide who later killed herself. “I do think that both of them need to step down from Congress,” Jayapal said.
“What we are seeing now is an emergence of women across the country who have been dismissed, told to shut up, told to move on —who have been abused by men in powerful positions. This is not a partisan issue,” Jayapal said.
Rep. Ro Khanna said Swalwell, a fellow California Democrat, should step down.
“There must be accountability with both House Ethics and law enforcement about the sexual assault, and Eric Swalwell should resign,” Khanna, a leader in Democratic efforts to investigate the Justice Department’s Epstein files, said in a statement on X Sunday after appearing on Fox News.
Rep. James Walkinshaw, D-Va., said he agreed. “His campaign for governor is over whether he realizes it or not,” he said during an appearance on MS NOW’s “Alex Witt Reports” Sunday.
Rep. Anna Paulina Luna, a Florida Republican, announced this weekend that she will push an expulsion resolution this week against Swalwell, saying, “I am not going to serve with these sexual deviants, that is not what Congress is about.”
Swalwell, who was the frontrunner in the California governor’s race to replace current term-limited Gov. Gavin Newsom, has vehemently denied any wrongdoing. Newsom, seen as a 2028 Democratic presidential contender, has not weighed in on whether Swalwell should resign or at least end his campaign for governor. His office did not immediately respond to MS NOW’s request for comment on Sunday.
But he said in a statement issued Friday, “These allegations from multiple sources are deeply troubling and must be taken seriously.”
Rep. Byron Donalds, a Republican from Florida, said he, too, would support expulsion resolutions for both Gonzalez and Swalwell. “If separate motions to expel the two congressmen come before the House, I will be voting yes on both measures,” Donalds said on “Meet the Press” Sunday.
The Manhattan District Attorney’s Office said on Saturday it launched an investigation into allegations of sexual assault against Swalwell, a one-time presidential candidate.
The main accuser, a former aide to Swalwell who spoke with MS NOW, first told the San Francisco Chronicle that the congressman sexually assaulted her on two separate occasions when she was too intoxicated to consent.
California House Democrats have turned on their colleague. Rep. Ted Lieu announced Friday he was withdrawing his endorsement of Swalwell for governor and Rep. Robert Garcia — another prominent advocate for Epstein survivors — called on Swalwell to quit the race.
Sen. Adam Schiff, D-Calif. withdrew his endorsement of Swalwell as campaign staffers abandoned him in droves. Rep. Jared Huffman, D-Ca., said Saturday that both Swalwell and Gonzalez should resign or face expulsion.
“Swalwell must halt his campaign, resign from office, and face the consequences of a full investigation,” California Rep. Sam Liccardo said Friday.
Senior staff working in Swalwell’s congressional office and on his gubernatorial campaign issued a joint letter over the weekend, saying they are “horrified” by the news reports detailing the sexual assault allegations against their boss and that any decision to remain on payroll “should not be viewed as support for Eric Swalwell.”
“We stand with our former colleague, and the other women who have come forward. We believe you should stand with them, too,” the letter said. “The behavior detailed in these reports is abhorrent, beneath the dignity of those serving in public office and betrays the trust of all Californians.”
Mychael Schnell and Jillian Frankel contributed to this report.
Erum Salam is a breaking news reporter for MS NOW, with a focus on how global events and foreign policy shape U.S. politics. She previously was a breaking news reporter for The Guardian.
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