You really have to hand it to the Trump administration.
They promised us they would hire only the best people.
Yet here we are watching Gregory Bovino, the man Donald Trump trusts to lead his anti-immigration crackdown, absolutely humiliate himself in a Minneapolis park.
Bovino, who is 55 years old and apparently old enough to know better, was filmed struggling to figure out how a smoke canister works.
After finally managing to pull the pin, he seemingly failed to check which way the wind was blowing.
The result?
He caught a faceful of his own green smoke.
It is almost poetic justice for the man known as Trump’s “commander-at-large.”
Chaos in the Twin Cities
While watching a MAGA tough guy spice his own face like a rotisserie chicken is objectively funny, the context is horrifying.
According to witnesses who spoke to the Minnesota Star Tribune, federal agents boxed in a vehicle at West 28th Street and Blaisdell Avenue.
They pulled out a Latino teenage boy and a girl.
As people gathered to yell at the officers, the agents forced a man to the ground.
Then, a colleague leaned in to spray a bright orange chemical irritant directly into his face, the Star Tribune reported.
bystanders were left rinsing their eyes on the sidewalks.
This is the reality of the Trump administration’s vision for law and order.
“Gas, Gas, Gas”
The incompetence tour continued at Mueller Park in the Whittier neighborhood around 2:30 p.m.
A caravan of federal vehicles pulled up.
Bovino decided it was time to put on a show.
“I’m gonna gas. Get back. Gas is coming. Gas is coming, second warning. Second warning,” he was heard saying on video.
He wasn’t done with the theatrics.
“Third warning. Gas, gas, gas,” Bovino added dramatically.
He then tossed the device and shoved people away from the street.
Plumes of green smoke rolled over the crowd.
Witnesses told the paper that several people were left coughing or vomiting from the smoke.
Green stains were left speckling the snow.
Tactical Failures
It gets worse.
In the middle of this chaos, an agent dropped a loaded rifle magazine in the snow and just left it behind.
Minneapolis police had to recover it later, according to a spokesperson quoted by The Star Tribune.
Nothing says “elite law enforcement” like leaving live ammunition lying around for anyone to find.
The paper also reported that one of the spent canisters was labeled “pocket tactical green smoke,” made by Defense Technology.
The label explicitly warns that users “should be trained in deployment, decontamination and first aid procedures.”
Judging by the green smoke in Bovino’s face, I am going to guess he skipped that training seminar.
A History of Lies
This unfortunately is not Bovino’s first rodeo.
He answers directly to Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem and travels city to city leading aggressive sweeps.
These encounters happened shortly after a federal appeals court lifted an injunction that barred agents from pepper-spraying peaceful protesters.
But judges have definitely noticed his behavior.
Barely two months ago, U.S. District Judge Sara Ellis in Chicago tore into his tactics.
She said she had seen “ample evidence that agents… intended to cause protesters harm.”
She found the Trump administration’s justifications “simply not credible.”
Ellis was focused on a clash in Chicago’s Little Village where Bovino lobbed tear gas over a crowd.
Plaintiffs accused Bovino and the DHS of fabricating a story that he only used gas after being hit in the head by a rock.
That claim collapsed once lawyers looked at the video.
Judge Ellis ruled that Bovino had admitted he lied about key details of what happened.
So we have a liar who can’t throw a smoke bomb properly leading federal forces.
Make America Great Again, indeed.
