DEAR EDITOR:

If I read the article in Friday’s paper (Feb. 6) correctly, a Mr. Charles Ingram allegedly posted videos calling for the killing of any number of people because of the performance of the ICE agents in Minneapolis. Among the persons he mentioned were border guards.

What is wrong with people like Mr. Ingram? Don’t they realize that someone who thinks that violence is the answer doesn’t really understand the discussion?

I have a son who has been a border guard for over 40 years. He would not have reacted the way that ICE agents acted in Minneapolis. Do people like Mr. Ingram want to kill my son? An ICE agent thug and an anti-ICE agent thug have one thing in common — they are both thugs.

I don’t want either of them for a neighbor, and I certainly don’t want them gunning for my son.

My son was a border guard on the Arizona border for about 15 years and is presently on the Michigan border. He would have been a calming influence had he been called to Minneapolis. He carries a gun, but he has told me that he doesn’t unholster it unless he is confronted with another gun. When he comes home at night, he places the gun in a secure location so that his teenage sons cannot get to it. His gun is no threat to anyone as long as he has control of it and he does his best to always be in control of it. He has mentioned this to his mother and me on different occasions and we are quite proud of the way that he handles his job.

I know what he says is true because no one told him to act this way; he made the decision on his own and he would defend his position if someone were to tell him to act differently. He has his own code of conduct; it is part of him and he will stick to it, even at the cost of disobeying orders to do so. Renee Good and Alex Pretti would have been safe around my son. We need more border guards and ICE agents like him. We don’t need someone gunning for my son when it’s people like him who provide calm to a sea of hatred.

We do not need more thugs; we need more pacifiers. We need more guards like my son. We do not want to eliminate (the elimination of?) the good guards by thugs on any political side.

DONALD BUTLER

Warr