Jenn Budd Appears on Frank Figliuzzi Show, Discusses CBP Cover-Up Teams and CIT-to-OPR Personnel Rotation

Opening

On April 15, 2026, former U.S. Border Patrol agent and whistleblower Jenn Budd appeared as a guest on The Frank Figliuzzi Show, hosted by former FBI Assistant Director for Counterintelligence Frank Figliuzzi (2010–2012), broadcast live on Lincoln Square Media and cross-posted to Figliuzzi’s Substack and YouTube channel. The episode was published under multiple titles: “Frank Welcomes Jenn Budd, Former Border Patrol Agent” (Substack) and “Can Immigration Enforcement Ever Be Fixed?” / “Inside Border Patrol: A Former Agent Explains the System” (Lincoln Square and YouTube). Budd discussed systemic corruption within CBP, including the Critical Incident Teams (CIT) cover-up apparatus and the Biden-era transfer of CIT personnel into CBP’s Office of Professional Responsibility (OPR).

What Happened / Key Facts

Jenn Budd, author of Against the Wall: My Journey from Border Patrol Agent to Immigrant Rights Activist (Beacon Press, 2022) and host of the Borderland Talk Substack, joined Figliuzzi’s live broadcast to discuss, per the Lincoln Square episode description, immigration enforcement accountability and her forthcoming e-book on ICE. The episode recording is available on YouTube at the URL above. Figliuzzi’s Substack page for the episode includes a “Transcript” link but the full transcript is paywalled for subscribers only.

The CIT-to-OPR rotation claim — the load-bearing structural point Budd has developed across multiple contemporaneous public writings — states:

• The structural claim (Budd, Borderland Talk, March 4, 2026): “agents from the illegal cover-up teams who had been moved to CBP were investigating the Alex Pretti shooting” — and that CBP Commissioner Rodney Scott “admitted [this] on live television” during congressional testimony.
• The mechanism (Budd, Borderland Talk, February 18, 2026): “the illegal Border Patrol Critical Incident Teams were moved by Biden to CBP in an attempt to coverup their coverups of agent use of force violations. CBP now houses the former Border Patrol coverup teams.”
• Named CIT personnel documented in the Valeria Tachiquin Alvarado case (Budd, Borderland Talk, April 10, 2026): Supervisory Border Patrol Agent Brian Smith; Senior Patrol Agent Joe Vaiasuso (also involved in the Anastasio Hernandez Rojas case); Border Patrol Agent Tracey Wong; Amy Mattraw; Elisabeth Berry; Robert Butler. Per Budd’s reporting, San Diego Sector’s CIT was called the Critical Incident Investigative Team (CIIT).

The specific verbatim quotes Budd made during the Figliuzzi broadcast about the CIT-OPR rotation could not be retrieved from publicly accessible sources in this research pass — the episode transcript is subscriber-paywalled on the Frank Figliuzzi Substack. The structural substance Budd discussed in the broadcast corresponds directly to the claims she was publishing contemporaneously across her own Substack series in the same timeframe.

Rodney Scott’s congressional testimony context: Budd’s written record (March 4, 2026) states that Scott acknowledged on live television (during the February 12, 2026 Senate HSGAC hearing) that the Pretti shooting investigation was being conducted by FBI, ICE, and CBP’s OPR — the same OPR unit that now houses former CIT personnel. Scott’s written testimony from that hearing is publicly listed on the CBP website (https://www.cbp.gov/about/congressional-resources/testimony/Scott-HSGAC-12FEB26) but was inaccessible (403) during this research pass.

Why This Event Matters

The Figliuzzi appearance represents the highest-profile named-source broadcast platform Budd has used to discuss the CIT-OPR rotation pattern. Figliuzzi’s audience includes national-security-attentive readers and MSNBC viewers; his credibility as a former FBI counterintelligence AD lends institutional weight to the accountability framing. The broadcast coincided with Budd’s active publication series documenting the same structural pattern — the CIT agents who ran cover-ups under Border Patrol were transferred by the Biden administration to CBP/OPR rather than being prosecuted or terminated, and are now operating under Trump-era CBP Commissioner Rodney Scott in the same investigative capacity. Budd’s core claim: this is not administrative reform but administrative relabeling — the cover-up apparatus continued under a different org-chart header.

Broader Context

Budd has documented the Critical Incident Teams across multiple high-profile cases:

• Anastasio Hernandez Rojas (killed May 28, 2010): documented in the HBO-Max documentary Critical Incident: Death at the Border (released December 2025, Emmy and Peabody nominated), in which Budd participated.
• Valeria Tachiquin Alvarado (U.S. citizen, killed 2012): Budd’s April 10, 2026 Substack article names the CIIT personnel involved.
• Alex Pretti (killed January 25, 2026, Minneapolis): Budd’s March 4, 2026 Substack article documents that former CIT agents now in OPR were assigned to the Pretti shooting investigation.

The CIT history: Biden administration disbanded the official CIT units in May 2022 after civil-rights attorneys publicized their existence during the Hernandez Rojas litigation. The restructuring moved personnel to CBP’s OPR rather than removing them. The GAO issued a report (GAO-24-106148) on OPR’s post-CIT functioning.

Research Gaps

• Full transcript of the April 15, 2026 Figliuzzi-Budd episode — paywalled on thefrankfigliuzzi.substack.com; Mark should consider accessing via subscriber account or asking Budd directly for the recording.
• Verbatim timestamps for the CIT-OPR rotation discussion within the episode (if multiple segments covered different topics).
• Scott’s February 12, 2026 Senate HSGAC testimony full text — CBP.gov returned 403; may be available via Senate Finance Committee direct download (https://www.finance.senate.gov/download/04302025-scott-testimony) or senate.gov archives.
• Confirmation of whether the YouTube “Inside Border Patrol: A Former Agent Explains the System” (watch?v=6cKDNNsci8Y) is the same recording as the April 15 Substack live or a separately edited/dated episode.
• Named individuals: which specific former CIT agents are now in CBP/OPR positions with oversight authority over the Pretti case? Brian Smith, Joe Vaiasuso documented in Tachiquin case — their current OPR status unconfirmed.

Related Entries

• budd-jenn — actor profile, whistleblower and primary on-record source for CIT-OPR rotation pattern
• tomsheck-james — complementary whistleblower, CBP internal affairs chief 2006–2014
• priority-cit-to-opr-named-individual-personnel-rotation-tracking-jenn-budd-source — parent personnel-rotation tracking task
• pretti-shooting-cover-up-architecture-and-cit-opr-connections-jan-25-2026 — related task on Pretti shooting CIT-OPR connections