U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) is reportedly directing agents on how to address members of the public by prohibiting the use of “he, him, she, her” pronouns.
An internal memo obtained by the Heritage Foundation’s Oversight Project through a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request revealed that agents are being directed to avoid the use of gender-specific pronouns when first interacting with someone.
“DO NOT use ‘he, him, she, her’ pronouns until you have more information about, or provided by, the individual,” reads the memo that Heritage shared with Fox News Digital.
Agents are to use “a universal greeting, such as ‘Good Morning’ or ‘Good Evening’ in the initial greeting,” according to the memo.
“If an incorrect pronoun is used and corrected by the individual, acknowledge the oversight and use the correct pronoun,” the memo reportedly reads.
“It also lists ‘key terms’ with definitions next to each: bisexual, gay, gender expression, gender identity, gender non-conforming, intersex, lesbian, non-binary, queer, questioning, sex assigned at birth, sexual orientation, transgender, transgender woman, transgender man and transitioning are all listed,” Fox News reported, noting that the memo also stresses that terms and definitions “are not universal” and that some LGBTQ people “may define these terms differently and the meanings of the terms may change over time.”
Notably, illegal migrants are the “members of the public” whom agents are most often engaged with, according to Oversight Project Director Mike Howell who spoke with Fox News Digital in an interview Tuesday.
“Border Patrol deals with more illegal aliens than any entity in the federal government. This forced language guidance is designed to coddle illegal aliens,” Howell said.
“I guess it wasn’t enough for the Biden administration to betray the Border Patrol by purposefully unleashing chaos on the southern border,” he added. “Now, the radical political leadership is enrolling agents in a forced-speech program to call illegal aliens by their preferred pronouns.”
The memo’s introduction reads:
This job aid provides guidance to all CBP employees who interact with members of the public to help facilitate effective communication with the diverse public we serve, including individuals who identify as lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer or questioning, intersex, non-binary, and gender nonconforming (LGBTQI+)
It also notes that the directions “should be used by all CBP employees.”
Howell condemned the guidance, asserting that CBP agents “should be allowed to do their job and prevent all illegal immigration, not used as pawns in some sick social experiment.”
A similar pronoun guide was previously issued in an email to employees by the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), according to a report by Heritage’s Oversight Project.
“All employees should be addressed [by] the names and pronouns they use to describe themselves,” read the email which was part of the agency’s “Gender Identity and Non-Discrimination Guidance,” which purportedly protects “employee rights and protections related to gender identity.”
Fox News Digital’s multiple requests to CBP for comment reportedly went unanswered.
