Border Patrol’s commander is developing a habit of getting kicked out of places where he’s worn out his welcome.
Just days after Gregory Bovio, CBP’s “commander-at-large,” was pulled out of Minnesota by President Donald Trump, after overseeing a violent street immigration sweep that last month led to the fatal shootings of two Americans, he was kicked out of a Las Vegas bar to keep its patrons safe.
The Bottled Blonde bar in Vegas has told the Beast that staff asked Bovino to leave its three-story sports bar on the city’s famous Strip—where he had been photographed drinking red wine and laughing with a group of male acolytes—and escorted him off the premises to protect those inside.
The Daily Beast revealed on Wednesday how Bovino, 55, had been in Sin City for what appeared to be a boozy night out after Trump, 79, stripped him of his role fronting Operation Metro Surge in Minneapolis.
The Minneapolis crackdown saw his self-styled “Green Machine” unit of masked and armed agents storm city streets, rough up protesters, and leave two Americans—unarmed mom Renee Nicole Good and VA ICU nurse Alex Pretti, both 37—dead.
“Bottled Blonde does not engage in political activity or affiliations. As a private business, Bottled Blonde reserves the right to refuse service to any patron at its discretion,” the venue said in a statement.
“Upon becoming aware of the individual’s presence, the patron was asked to leave the premises and was escorted out by staff in accordance with venue policy to maintain a safe and orderly environment for all patrons.”
Trump’s advisers concluded that scenes of Bovino’s militarized “Green Machine” squads dragging people off sidewalks, firing projectiles at crowds, and yanking kids away from schools were politically toxic.
On Jan. 27, three days after Pretti’s killing, the White House shipped him back to his old El Centro sector in California and cut him off from his beloved official government X account, sending in border czar Tom Homan in Bovino’s place to restore calm to the city.
Three days later, on Jan. 30, Bovino was filmed in Bottled Blonde swigging from a large glass of red and laughing with a group of younger men.
Footage and stills taken after his removal from the bar showed him heading down Las Vegas Boulevard with the same group. It is not known who the men were in relation to Bovino.
The images triggered a wave of anger online, with some users accusing Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem’s former “commander-at-large” of partying in Sin City while families in Minneapolis were still mourning Good and Pretti.
Bovino’s Nevada outing appears to have been another stop on Bovino’s path back to likely imminent retirement.
It wasn’t always that way. Bovino had revelled in his elevation by Noem to run her frontline immigration sweeps, and his aggressive tactics became the public face of Trump’s deportation drive.
But after Pretti was killed—moments after Bovino’s Border Patrol agents threw him to the pavement while Pretti was protecting a female protester—and three weeks after Good was shot by ICE agent Jonathan Ross, polling showed voters recoiling from the chaos, and from Bovino.
Bovino worsened his public standing when he went on television to echo Noem’s claim that Pretti was a would-be “terrorist.” Bovino insisted without evidence that Pretti had planned to massacre officers, sparking outrage and damaging Noem’s standing with Trump.
That performance, sources said, was the final straw inside the West Wing, where he was branded a political headache and quietly pushed aside.
The Daily Beast has contacted Bovino for comment.
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