Joe Rogan used a wide-ranging conversation with screenwriter Joe Eszterhas on Wednesday to unload on the Trump administration's immigration enforcement — warning that a militarized, unidentified police force on American streets sets a dangerous precedent regardless of who's in power.
"It is a very slippery slope when you give people — and they're trained for seven weeks — this militarized police force that has no identification on the streets," Rogan said on an episode of The Joe Rogan Experience. "That's a precedent that you might like when it's for a cause that you support, but that could easily be for a cause that you do not support."
The podcast host also took aim at the wardrobe of former Border Patrol Commander-at-Large Gregory Bovino, who became the public face of Trump's immigration sweeps before being stripped of his commander title in January following the deaths of two U.S. citizens in Minneapolis.
"That guy had a very odd way of dressing — he wore outfits that were reminiscent of, like, Nazi Germany," Rogan said. "I had to make sure that this wasn't AI. I was like, is this a real coat that he's wearing?"
Bovino's olive wool greatcoat sparked an international firestorm when images of him commanding operations on the streets of Minneapolis went viral. Germany's Süddeutsche Zeitung wrote that Bovino "looks like a Nazi officer," while California Gov. Gavin Newsom called it "Nazi-coded" and later posted "Gestapo Greg is out" after Bovino's demotion. Bovino said the coat was standard Border Patrol issue, purchased in 1999.
Eszterhas, the Basic Instinct screenwriter and Hungarian-born immigrant who fled refugee camps as a child, didn't miss the irony. "Joe, I did," he said of coming to America. "My parents did. I personify the American dream."
Bovino subsequently announced his retirement from the Border Patrol in March.
