Biden administration targets Mexican cartel, Chinese companies in fight to halt fentanyl
With U.S. seizures of the synthetic opioid fentanyl on the rise, the Biden administration announced Friday a number of sweeping arrests and financial sanctions aimed at disrupting the production and trafficking of the drug across the U.S. border.
The State Department also announced an unprecedented 27 rewards, including one of up to $10 million for information leading to the arrest and conviction of Iván Archivaldo Guzmán Sálazar and Jesús Alfredo Guzmán Salazar, two high-level members of Mexico’s Sinaloa cartel and sons of Mexican drug lord Joaquin “El Chapo” Guzmán.
The two are among 28 members of the powerful cartel who were charged Friday by the U.S. Justice Department as part of a sweeping fentanyl investigation. A senior administration official, speaking to reporters after the indictments were announced, described the brothers as cartel leaders who “pioneered the manufacture and trafficking of fentanyl” and “are responsible for the massive influx of fentanyl entering the United States over the last eight years. A third brother, Ovidio Guzmán López, has also been charged.
“They know that they’re poisoning their customers often without the customer’s knowledge, and they don’t care,” the official said. “They’re also a highly organized and sophisticated business employing military-grade weapons and vehicles and hundreds of people to protect the cartel and its leaders at all costs.”
Halting the flow of fentanyl into U.S. markets is a key priority for the Biden administration and its top officials. In Florida, like elsewhere across the United States, the drug is a growing and major contributor to a sharp spike in deaths from opioids. This was true as far back as 2016, even before the drug’s popularity spiked to what it is currently.
A report at the time showed that deaths linked to fentanyl, often illegally imported from clandestine labs in China and Mexico, skyrocketed 310 percent in Miami-Dade and 100 percent in Broward.
Last year, the drug, which is 50 times more powerful than heroin, was linked to at least 10 overdoses in South Florida in less than a week.
Earlier this year Todd Robinson, the assistant secretary of state in charge of the Bureau of Narcotics and International Law Enforcement Affairs, told the Miami Herald that the synthetic opioid was “a game-changer” in the hemisphere and is challenging the administration in ways other illicit drug trafficking had not.
“The fact that you can make these drugs in a room ... and make enough to wipe out entire communities is really changing the game and we’ve been going at it in a more traditional way,” he said at the time.
Friday’s indictments were also accompanied by announcements from the Treasury Department of financial sanctions against two entities in China and five individuals, based in China and Guatemala, for supplying precursor chemicals to drug cartels in Mexico for the production of fentanyl intended for U.S. markets.
“We think the role of the PRC [People’s Republic of China] looms large,” said another senior official, adding that the administration is trying to “get countries to step up and do more” to help disrupt the supply.
The flow of synthetic drugs and its devastating consequences, one official said, is a global problem.
U.S. law enforcement agencies consider fentanyl one of the deadliest drug threats the U.S. has ever faced. U.S. Customs and Border Protection has reported that seizures have increased by more than 400% over the 2019 fiscal year, and that seizures for this fiscal year, which began on Oct. 1, have already surpassed the figure for 2022.
“We have increased our focus on targeting the shipments of chemical precursors from source countries by working with [Homeland Security Investigations], foreign partners and industry to analyze and target illicit movements in the air and maritime cargo environments,” an official said. “This targeting allows law enforcement personnel to seize these precursors before they can be synthesized into fentanyl.”
