Today’s episode opened with that slightly unsteady, coffee-in-hand feeling that comes from waking up to bad news and realizing there’s no easing into the morning.
Lawrence Winnerman and I were both already spun up by what we’d seen overnight — Minneapolis all over the headlines, another ICE shooting, the sense that something has shifted from “alarming” to unmistakably dangerous. Before we could spiral too far on our own, though, we brought in the reason so many of you had been tagging us nonstop: Jenn Budd.
Jen is a former senior patrol agent with the U.S. Border Patrol and the author of Against the Wall. She’s been having a very deserved moment on Substack for telling the truth about what these agencies are and how they actually operate.
Jenn introduced herself plainly and powerfully, walking us through her path from a liberal upbringing in Alabama, to joining Border Patrol in the mid-90s, to eventually resigning because of corruption, violence, and what she described as a culture that rewards brutality and covers up crime. Her story included trauma, personal and institutional, but what stood out was her clarity about how deliberate all of this is.
A lot of the conversation centered on the killing of Renee Good and why that video has been sitting so heavily with so many of us. Jen broke down the tactics used in that encounter, connecting it to older cases she’d witnessed and investigated, and explaining why the release of the video wasn’t a mistake; it was meant to justify the killing to a very specific audience.
She also talked through how ICE, CBP, and Border Patrol differ, and why Border Patrol agents being put in charge of ICE right now is not accidental.
We talked about Christian nationalism, Bible verse Isaiah 6:8, and how religious framing is used to give moral cover to violence. Jen explained how agents are taught to see themselves as righteous, even redemptive, while labeling entire communities as threats.
When we asked what’s changed recently, why things feel more extreme, she pointed to new funding, accelerated hiring, and policy memos that effectively green-light violence.
The hardest part of the hour was also the most grounding: Jen was honest that there’s no magic de-escalation strategy, that fear and chaos are the point, and that community organizing and mutual aid matter more now than spectacle.
Somehow, we closed by laughing about Dead Milkmen songs and “Bitchin’ Camaro,” because that’s what Gen X does. We stare straight at the horror and still find a way to remember who we are.
Be sure to catch Jenn’s interview on the 2025 HBO/MAX documentary Critical Incident: Death At The Border.
We love you all—truly!—mean it.
We’ll be back tomorrow morning bright and early for our Fucked Up Friday Show on The Daily Whatever Show with our guest Ahmed Baba.
Thank you Nick Paro, NeuroDivergent Hodgepodge, Cat, Polly Walker Blakemore, You Ready Grandma, our moderator Karen Marie Shelton and many others for tuning into my live video with Jenn Budd, Lawrence Winnerman and GenXy.
