‘Mexican Cartels Basically Control Our Border Now’

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Heritage Foundation

As the fentanyl crisis ravages the country, elected officials and former border protection and drug enforcement officers are calling on the Biden administration to take action to secure the U.S.-Mexico border. 

“If you look at the age group of people between 18 and 45 over the past year, the leading cause of death is not COVID. It’s not cancer. It’s not car wrecks. It’s not guns. The leading cause of death with that age group is fentanyl, and it is devastating,” Texas Gov. Greg Abbott said during a panel discussion hosted by The Heritage Foundation on Thursday. (The Daily Signal is the news outlet of The Heritage Foundation.)

Heritage Foundation President Kevin Roberts opened the event by stressing that’s not a Democrat or Republican issue, but a human issue. 

“Sadly, the fact that more than 100,000 Americans lost their lives to a drug overdose between April 2020 and April 2021 is a grim reminder of the severity of the drug abuse epidemic in this country,” Roberts said. “The driving force behind most of those overdose deaths are synthetic opioids, primarily fentanyl, a drug chiefly created in clandestine laboratories run by Mexican cartels, who source their chemical precursors from China.”

 

In addition to Abbott, Rep. Brian Babin, R-Texas; former acting Drug Enforcement Administration chief Uttam Dhillon; and former acting Customs and Border Protection Commissioner Mark Morgan joined the panel discussion to share their experiences fighting the drug epidemic.

‘Texas Isn’t Going to Sit Idly By’ 

Abbott said Texas has had to take unprecedented state action to protect its border in the absence of federal assistance from the Biden administration. Texas has increased the presence of National Guard and Texas Department of Public Safety officers, seized more than 200 million doses of fentanyl, and has started building its own border wall, he said.