Good riddance to the Border Patrol bogeyman

Gregory Bovino, the face of deportation, had his dream job — and he blew it.

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CARLIN STIEHL Los Angeles Times BORDER PATROL chief Gregory Bovino, left, leads a show of force in downtown Los Angeles in August.

How would you feel about getting a dream gig only to see it end in disgrace because of, well, you? That's what Gregory Bovino gets to think about for the rest of his life. Friday was the Border Patrol lifer's last day on the job after 30 years and he ain't leaving because he wants to.

For the last year, the self-described "hillbilly" was the personification of the Trump administration's xenophobic deportation deluge. Helicopter invasions of apartment complexes, tear gas canisters thrown into large crowds, defying court orders, glamorous photo shoots: There was no municipality too big, no tactic too crazy, no quote too incendiary for Bovino to take on while he treated immigrant neighborhoods like the shores of Normandy.

The North Carolina native's caravan of cruelty quickly earned him a promotion from El Centro sector chief to Border Patrol commander at large, a new position crafted just for him.

He embraced the role of migra bogeyman like a tween boy scarfing down a bowl of Warheads, always promising more deportations, more chaos, more more.

Not anymore.

In January, Border Patrol agents shot and killed ICU nurse Alex Pretti during a protest against them a few weeks after an Immigration and Customs Enforcement officer did the same to Renée Good, a mother of three. Bovino threw napalm on the matter by claiming Pretti wanted to "massacre law enforcement" without offering any evidence. The incidents so soured the public on immigration agents that a Public Religion Research Institute poll released this week showed that only 35% of Americans surveyed approved of how Trump is handling immigration, compared with 48% a year ago.