Cracking down on the crackdown.

U.S. Border Patrol chief Gregory Bovino, the face of “Operation Midway Blitz” cracking down on illegal immigration, must report daily to a federal judge after reports of combative enforcement, including using tear gas.

I don’t think “combative” is the right word. It’s what you say when someone is getting a little too intense when arguing over a newspaper headline or similar. I think the word should be “aggressive” or “violent”. If we’re talking about tear gas versus shouting, we need a less emollient word than “combative.”

Bovino appeared Tuesday for a tense hearing before U.S. District Judge Sara Ellis at the Dirksen Federal Courthouse in downtown Chicago. She questioned him about reports of aggressive immigration enforcement and the federal agents’ treatment of protesters, journalists and even children during the ongoing “immigration blitz.”

There you go. Aggressive. Scratch “combative”.

The hearing was part of an ongoing lawsuit brought by local media organizations alleging that federal agents have violated prior court orders restricting their use of force. Those orders forbid [ban] agents from using tear gas or “riot control” weapons without giving two warnings and from deploying them against people who pose no immediate threat.

Well where’s the fun in that?

“They don’t have to like what you’re doing. And that’s OK. That’s what democracy is,” Ellis said during the hearing, referring to protesters or others who might be voicing opposition to federal agents on the ground. “They can say they don’t like what you’re doing, that they don’t like how you’re enforcing the laws, that they wish you would leave Chicago and take the agents with you. They can say that, and that’s fine. But they can’t get teargassed for it.”

You know why? Because it’s not against the law, that’s why. We’re allowed to talk back.

[T]he tone was serious as Ellis read anecdotes aloud from reports that federal agents had used tear gas in Chicago neighborhoods during Halloween festivities. “Kids were tear gassed on their way to celebrate Halloween,” the judge said, referring to an incident in the Old Irving Park neighborhood on Chicago’s North Side. “Those kids were dressed up in their Halloween costumes. You can imagine, their sense of safety was shattered.”

Yes but they were insurgents. They were disloyal. They were Antifa. They were anti-Trump. It’s got to stop!