A federal judge gave Donald Trump’s Border Patrol commander Gregory Bovino a humiliating dressing down and demanded he report to her courtroom every weekday to explain his force’s controversial actions—effective immediately.
U.S. District Judge Sara Ellis told Bovino, who is the face of the Trump administration’s on-the-ground immigration enforcement, to appear daily at 6 p.m. to detail their operations in Chicago.
Judge Ellis also demanded that the agency hand over all use-of-force reports and corresponding body-camera video from Sept. 2 to Oct. 25 by Friday.
She did so after videos showed agents firing chemical agents across residential blocks and at demonstrations citywide, as well as at a children’s Halloween parade last weekend.
The judge on Tuesday reiterated her rule limiting riot-control weapons and requiring warnings and identification—even going as far as reminding Bovino that it is not okay to tear-gas kids.
“Kids dressed in Halloween costumes walking to a parade do not pose an immediate threat,” she said, in a scathing reference to the incident in Chicago’s Old Irving Park district on Saturday. “You can’t use riot control weapons against them.”
During the same incident, it was alleged that a 67-year-old U.S. citizen suffered six broken ribs and internal bleeding after he was pulled out of a car and kneeled on by Border Patrol agents while returning from a run.
At the hearing, Ellis added that Bovino’s masked goons must leave journalists alone to work and that they must all wear switched-on body cameras when dealing with the public.
Bovino claimed “99 percent” of his 201 Chicago agents have body cameras but—under questioning—he admitted that he did not wear one himself.
Ellis demanded that Bovino get the kit and learn to use it by Friday.
The judge’s micromanagement of Bovino’s team’s actions follows days of clashes in Chicago, where agents deployed tear gas without clear audible warnings, according to footage reviewed in court.
Ellis called it “difficult… to see that the force being used is necessary.”
In a prior order, Ellis had mandated cameras on agents, visible ID, and two warnings before any chemical agents.
“Operation Midway Blitz” has become a signature of Trump-era interior enforcement in Chicago, with Bovino as its face.
The push has attracted fierce scrutiny after agents were accused of firing chemical rounds near families and interfering with reporters.
Bovino himself was criticised for throwing tear gas during an incident last week, a potential breach of the court order, which is partly what led to him being dragged into court.
The Department for Homeland Security said he had done so because he had been hit in the head by a rock thrown by one of a group of protesters, who had swarmed his team. Plaintiffs dispute this account.
At a federal level, there is a deep split over immigration enforcement tactics—whether to lean on ICE’s more targeted arrest model or bring in Border Patrol for highly visible sweeps, amid allegations of racial profiling and heavy-handed force.
The Daily Beast has contacted DHS for comment.
Who is Gregory Bovino?
As he stepped out of a Border Patrol vehicle and walked into court on Tuesday, flanked by his masked and armed “Green Army” of Border Patrol agents, Donald Trump’s grizzled immigration supremo Bovino appeared in his element.
Given his role often puts him in high-risk and high-pressure situations, Bovino seemed unfazed by the anger and aggression from protesters who had turned up to heckle him for what they see as bringing chaos to the streets of Chicago.
Instead, following the hearing, the nearly 30-year Border Patrol veteran waved and saluted to those who had turned up to cheer his immigration crackdown in the city.
Bovino, who joined the agency in 1996 and rose to run the sector in El Centro, California, has become a roving commander renowned for his headline-grabbing urban raids.
With his unmistakable crew-cut hair, Bovino has become the most recognisable and divisive face of Trump’s street immigration crackdown—and he appears to revel in his hardcore no-nonsense reputation.
Bovino has leaned heavily into publicity—fronting cameras, narrating videos of raids, and defending aggressive tactics as necessary for officer safety and deterrence—making him something of a hero among the anti-immigration MAGA crowd.
In 2023, he was briefly relieved of command amid controversy over social media posts and testimony critical of conditions under the Biden administration.
But, having been brought back into the fold, in Los Angeles earlier this year, his “turn-and-burn” raids drew allegations of race-based stops and force against non-violent crowds.
Close to the agency’s mandatory retirement age of 57, he was shifted to Chicago in September to run “Midway Blitz,” where Judge Ellis has now placed his operations under rare daily judicial supervision.
With Bovino and his Border Patrol agents having been accused of breaching her previous order, the court, and wider world, armed with cameraphones to capture their conduct, will continue to watch closely.
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