Scott said he couldn’t go into specific details of the agency’s plans for the park because of numerous pending lawsuits, but he reiterated that the project would not include tall steel walls.
He also said the agency’s stated goal of protecting the country and knowing what’s coming in and out is “non-negotiable.”
He said the region’s formidable natural barriers were not enough to stop people from entering the country illegally through other, more navigable points. And he expressed concern that cartels that control smuggling from Mexico to the United States would exploit any opening.
CBP under fire for immigration enforcement tactics
Scott leads an agency of 67,000 employees responsible for controlling who and what enters the country through official border crossings like airports or seaports and stopping illegal smuggling and migration outside of these official border crossings.
The agency came under intense scrutiny last year when its agents were sent to cities in the heartland to help carry out Trump’s immigration crackdown alongside Immigration and Customs Enforcement.
As protests against an operation rocked Minneapolis, a Border Patrol officer and a CBP officer both fired shots during a confrontation that killed a U.S. citizen, Alex Pretti. The shooting ultimately prompted the Trump administration to end high-profile crackdowns in the cities. A CBP officer who was the face of the missions, Gregory Bovino, who led a helicopter raid on a tall building and used chemical agents to confront protesters, retired earlier this year.
Scott said that while CBP still helps ICE, it is now less involved in fighting immigration far from the country’s borders because ICE has since hired more agents into its ranks. Scott would not comment on the investigation into Pretti’s murder, saying it was being handled by the FBI and was ongoing. And when asked about Bovino’s tactics, he replied that the officer did not report to him during operations.
Scott spoke with the AP just outside the border with Canada, where he met with border security officials from other countries to share information on threats and trends. During his trip, he visited an operations center where he said Canadian and American law enforcement work together.
This border presents far fewer threats than the US border with Mexico. Scott said Mexican cartels are increasingly sending drones into the United States to move contraband and surveil Border Patrol agents. In Mexico, cartels use drones to attack each other or attack Mexican law enforcement.
The Department of Homeland Security, which includes CBP, recently announced temporary flight restrictions targeting unauthorized drone activity in an area stretching 1 mile north of the U.S.-Mexico border in an effort to combat cartels.
“We want to make sure,” Scott said, “that this threat does not enter the United States.”
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