By José Niño
In a rare instance of institutional competence, the California National Guard’s Counterdrug Task Force confiscated roughly $3.8 million of fentanyl back in August at the state’s ports of entry according to an announcement made by Gov. Gavin Newsom (D-Calif.) on Oct.1, 2024.
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Fentanyl is a highly potent synthetic opioid, roughly 50 to 100 times stronger than morphine and 50 times stronger than heroin. Initially, it was developed to treat severe pain but has subsequently been produced for illicit means and abusive forms of consumption.
Among the guard’s haul were more than 772,000 pills containing fentanyl. This brings the total amount of fentanyl pills and fentanyl powder confiscated since January to 9.6 million and 5,000 pounds, respectively. These seizures constitute an estimated street value of $43 million.
From the timeframe of 2006 to 2023, California experienced roughly 7,000 overdose deaths connected to the use of fentanyl, as per data from the California Department of Public Health. Frighteningly, overdose deaths increased by 121% from 2019 to 2021.
Border officials confiscated 26,700 pounds of fentanyl at the southern border in 2023. This represented a 480% increase from 2020, per a report released by the organization National Immigration Forum.
America’s fentanyl crisis is no joke. In the period of 2010 up until 2024, the total number of fentanyl overdose deaths stateside is estimated to be between 400,000 to 450,000. In 2021, fentanyl-related deaths topped 71,000, reflecting its dominance in the opioid crisis. These fatality figures resemble that of a world war.
Working-class whites have been most impacted by fentanyl and similar opioids. Owing to their economically precarious status and declining social stature, many working-class whites go down a vicious cycle of alcohol and drug use to escape from the stark realities of living under a political system that hates them.
U.S. policymakers have responded to the fentanyl scourge, albeit in a ham-fisted manner. Democrats have generally proposed reactive measures such as fentanyl treatment and harm reduction. The promotion of such measures invariably leads to the creation of a cottage industry of non-government organizations that provide make-work roles for Democrat constituencies but don’t go straight to the root of the fentanyl issue, especially on how it’s arriving to the United States.
For their part, Republicans have taken advantage of the anti-China hysteria to blame China for all of America’s fentanyl-related problems. There is a nugget of truth with respect to these arguments. China has historically been the largest source of both fentanyl and fentanyl precursors—the chemicals used to produce fentanyl. These chemicals are then sold to criminal organizations, particularly Mexican cartels. China also ships fentanyl straight to the United States through international mail or parcel services.
However, things have changed with respect to the production and trade of fentanyl in the last decade. Starting in April 2019, the Chinese government agreed to crack down on all forms of fentanyl and other closely related substances.
In the ensuing years, the Chinese government directly partnered with U.S. law enforcement agencies to stymie the fentanyl trade. Traffickers would be sentenced in courts on the Chinese mainland, while Chinese authorities confiscated large quantities of precursors en route to the Western Hemisphere. The U.S. Drug Enforcement Agency would set up offices across China to combat fentanyl trade.
Indeed, Chinese entities still provide fentanyl precursors to Mexican drug cartels. However, the cartels are the ones who are primarily producing fentanyl from these smuggled ingredients, packaging it, and smuggling it across the U.S. border. Notable Mexican drug cartels such as Jalisco New Generation Cartel (CJNG) and the Sinaloa Cartel import fentanyl precursors from China and other countries. They subsequently use these chemicals to synthesize fentanyl in secret laboratories, usually located in northern Mexico.
Once the fentanyl is produced, it is smuggled across the U.S. southern border with Mexico, often hidden in vehicles, cargo shipments, or even people crossing the border. Since the Chinese government scheduled all fentanyl-related substances in 2019, Mexican cartels have simply filled the gap by ramping up domestic production.
Even if China were to hypothetically disappear from the map, fentanyl will still make its way to the United States via Mexico. Drug cartels are sophisticated enough to routinely exploit flaws in the U.S. border security infrastructure.
The problems the United Stated is currently facing are surmountable. However uncomfortable the decisions that must be made are, they must be carried through if the United States is to remain a functional polity. The first step is to correctly identify the problems we are facing and then forcefully implement the necessary actions to set things straight. Securing the southern border with sufficient manpower and building a border wall is a matter of common sense and national security. It would greatly curtail the flow of fentanyl and other illegal drugs to the United States.
Until the security issues at the southern border are resolved, fentanyl and similar drugs will continue to flood the country and cause major social harm to America.
José Niño is a freelance writer based in Austin, Texas. You can contact him via Facebook and Twitter. Get his e-book, The 10 Myths of Gun Control at josealbertonino.gumroad.com. Subscribe to his “Substack” newsletter by visiting “Jose Nino Unfiltered” on Substack.com.
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