DAILY CALLER NEWS FOUNDATION—Retired Border Patrol chief Rodney Scott blew the whistle to the Daily Caller News Foundation on what he calls the Biden-Harris administration’s going to great lengths to hide the illegal immigration crisis from the public, just days after a current sector chief made similar claims.

Aaron Heitke, a former chief patrol agent for the Border Patrol’s San Diego sector, testified before a House committee Sept. 18 that the White House ordered agents to hide information on arrests of so-called special interest aliens or SIAs, move masses of illegal migrants out of sight of the press, and give other instructions to disguise the true level of the border crisis.

Scott, who led Border Patrol from roughly the last year of the Trump-Pence administration to the first seven months of the Biden-Harris administration, told the Daily Caller News Foundation that he was given similar orders.

“There was a gag order put on us literally within minutes of the Biden administration taking office,” Scott said.

“The chief of staff for Customs and Border Protection, when she arrived, one of her first orders was to forbid us from talking to the public, or doing press releases, or doing media without the White House clearing our statements,” Scott said. “Not only were they not cleared, when they finally did give us talking points, they weren’t even accurate. They weren’t truthful.”

Scott’s tenure as Border Patrol leader overlapped with Biden’s assignment of Vice President Kamala Harris to address the root causes of illegal immigration from Central America. The retired chief confirmed that Harris never once spoke to him, even after her designation as “border czar.”

Having worked for the Border Patrol since the early 1990s, Scott experienced multiple changes in presidential administration. The longtime officer said higher-ups’ clamping down on communication to the public was nothing new, but the sheer level of control handed down by the Biden-Harris administration was nothing he had experienced before.

“No press conferences were approved, all border tours were shut down,” Scott said. “It was unprecedented. I’ve never seen a gag order that tight.”

Scott’s comments follow the testimony given by Heitke, in which the former San Diego sector chief agent said he was prohibited from talking about the rising number of special interest aliens—those who potentially pose a national security risk to the U.S.—unlawfully crossing the border.

“Prior to this administration, the San Diego sector averaged 10–15 SIAs per year,” Heitke told the House Homeland Security Committee. “Once word was out that the border was far easier to cross, San Diego went to over 100 SIAs in 2022, way over 100 SIAs in 2023, and more than that this year.”

“These are only the ones we caught. At the time, I was told I could not release any information on this increase in SIAs or mention any of the arrests,” Heitke testified. “The administration was trying to convince the public that there was no threat at the border.”

Heitke also went into detail about steps he said the Biden-Harris administration took to hide masses of migrants from reporters, accusing the White House of portraying “fiction” to the public.

“Each time we asked for help in dealing with a new issue, it fell on deaf ears,” Heitke said. “At times in San Diego, we had 2,000 or more aliens sitting in between the fences asking to turn themselves in. I was told to move them out of sight of the media.”

This is not the first time agents have accused the Biden-Harris administration of intentionally trying to cover up the extent of the border crisis from the media.

Ahead of Harris’ first trip to the border in El Paso, Texas, in 2021, administration officials gave explicit instructions to clear the area of migrants to put on a “show” for the vice president, according to Border Patrol sources who spoke to the New York Post.

Although an executive order issued by President Joe Biden in June led to a steady decline in illegal crossings along the U.S.-Mexico border in recent months, the Biden-Harris administration had overseen a major wave of illegal immigration into the country after issuing a slate of executive orders that largely dismantled the Trump-Pence administration’s border agenda.

Border Patrol agents reported encountering more than 7 million migrants illegally crossing into the U.S. since the beginning of the Biden-Harris administration, according to the latest data from U.S. Customs and Border Protection.

The massive wave of illegal migration has strained the resources of major sanctuary cities such as New York City and Chicago, but also smaller towns in the heartland such as Springfield, Ohio.

Scott commended his former colleague for speaking out, noting that doing so puts his ability to make an income at risk. Many retired agents don’t speak out because companies and other private contractors that work with the federal government want to avoid the publicity that can come with working with or hiring whistleblowers, according to the retired Border Patrol chief.

“I think it’s very problematic that the administration is trying to hide so much relevant information from the public,” Scott said. “I’m very, very grateful that Chief Heitke stepped up and decided to share that information with the public because that really hurts his ability to get contract jobs in the future.”

Heitke is “not only taking a risk, he’s knowingly cutting his family’s income by standing up for what’s right,” he said.

The Department of Homeland Security and the White House did not respond to a request for comment.

Originally published by the Daily Caller News Foundation