Editor’s note: White House press secretary Jen Psaki, answering questions about Border Patrol efforts to stop Haitian refugees from entering Texas, told reporters Sept. 23, 2021, that Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas had just informed “civil rights leaders” that the Biden administration “would no longer be using horses” in the Del Rio sector. The Daily Signal produced this video report in 2017.
SAN DIEGO—Since Congress established the U.S. Border Patrol in 1924, a lot has changed. From ATVs to drones, agents are constantly tapping into the latest technology to keep the country’s borders safe. But amid all the change, one unit inside the U.S. Border Patrol has, since its start, essentially remained the same: the Horse Patrol Unit.
“The Border Patrol was born on the back of horses,” says Jamie Cluff, supervisory Border Patrol agent of the San Diego Sector Horse Patrol Unit. “In 1924, when the Border Patrol was established by Congress, horse training was actually part of the curriculum. They would learn how to ride a horse and that’s how they would patrol, that was a mode of transportation.”
Watch the video to learn why nearly a century later, the Border Patrol Horse Patrol Unit remains such an asset.
