U.S. Border Patrol recruiting former agents

TUCSON, AZ (Tucson News Now) - The U.S. Border Patrol Tucson Sector wants to rehire former agents.

A tweet posted Thursday, April 13 by @CBPArizona, the official account of the U.S. Customs and Border Protection in all of Arizona, is the most recent recruiting push.

Agent Christopher Sullivan in the Tucson Sector Border Patrol public affairs office explained why this visible effort is happening now.

"We are trying to hire for attrition, meet mandates of staffing levels, there's an executive order that we're trying to hire more agents and that's one of the messages we want to send out is that we're hiring and this is a way we can reach potential applicants that have been cleared as agents," Sullivan explained.

He said some agents leave to pursue opportunities with different agencies or personal reasons, but learn they miss the action of being a Border Patrol agent and this is an opportunity to come back. A choice that's been available, but hasn't been as well-marketed.

Sullivan told Tucson News Now men and women who've done the job before are great candidates.

They have already passed a background check and can be put on a faster track to start the job than a recruit with no experience.

"Some of the benefits of rehiring previous agents is that they don't have to travel to the academy and get retrained. They're already trained as agents previously, so it saves us money as in training costs and it also streamlines the hiring process," said Sullivan.

In order to qualify for the rehiring process, a former agent must be in good standing and not have been fired.

To learn more about becoming a U.S. Border Patrol agent, visit https://www.usajobs.gov/GetJob/ViewDetails/466541400.

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