The U.S. Customs and Enforcement people are not the U.S. Border Patrol people. And they are not the only federal agencies going after the so-called “worst of the worst” and coming up short, but they have the highest profiles in Louisiana, and they’re the reason we’re in the national spotlight.
The Border Patrol operates in Louisiana from digs on Canal Street in downtown New Orleans. Gregory Bovino, the chief of the Border Patrol’s El Centro Sector and the guy President Donald Trump and Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem have been sending into metro areas to get rid of the “worst of the worst, made a point to exit with a gang of Border Patrol officers as a show of force on the busy commercial street.
ICE operates in several Louisiana locations. There are “processing centers” in Basile and Jena, and Angola’s former Camp J is now Camp 57, a holding place for those detained based on assumed or real immigration issues. Until last month, ICE operated from the Central Business District in New Orleans. Just weeks ago, that office moved from the bustling CBD to the more serene St. Rose in St. Charles Parish. The Border Patrol is still in New Orleans, with offices on Canal Street, the Lakefront Airport along Lake Pontchartrain and at the Louis Armstrong International Airport in Kenner…