Fentanyl Smugglers Are Starting to Increase the Use of United States Mail & Express Carriers
Jose Nino
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United States Customs and Border Protection officials have recently revealed that fentanyl smugglers are greatly increasing their use of the US Postal Service and other express carriers to transport illicit drugs into the US.
According to Bob Price of Breitbart News, CBP officials told Breitbart that the shipment of fentanyl into the US by smugglers through the US mail and other common express carriers such as FedEx, UPS, and DHL is increasing at alarming rates. During fiscal year 2022, which came to an end on September 30, 2022, CBP officers confiscated over 500 pounds of fentanyl in carrier facilities.
Price outlined how deadly this quantity of fentanyl being seized could be:
Drug Enforcement Administration officials report that as little as 2 milligrams of fentanyl can be fatal. There are nearly 453,592 milligrams per pound. The seizures in these facilities equate to nearly 227 million lethal doses.
During FY22, CBP officers confiscated 475.48 pounds of fentanyl in express carrier operations centers. This is an increase from FY 2020’s number of 162.97 pounds of fentanyl seized per data provided by CBP officials. This marks an increase of roughly 192%. In FY21, officers seized 405.02 pounds, which represented a 48% increase over FY 2020. In the first four months of FY23, officers confiscated an additional 77.97 pounds of fentanyl, per a CBP report.
The number of interdicted smuggling incidents is also on the rise. In FY2020, officials stopped 38 fentanyl shipments in these express carrier centers. These figures increased to 87 in FY21 and 131 in FY22. Thus far in 2023, officers stopped 26 additional smuggling attempts.
In the eight principal USPS international mail branches, officials report confiscating 30.88 pounds of fentanyl in FY22. This marks an increase from 23.94 pounds in FY21 and 24.68 pounds in FY 2020. So far in 2023, officers confiscated an additional 18.52 pounds of fentanyl in US international mail facilities.
CBP officials informed Breitbart that the fentanyl shipments come to the United States from China, Mexico, the Middle East, and other countries. CBP officers use multiple resources to locate and interdict these drug shipments. These consist of intelligence tips, K-9 searches of facilities and packages, and non-intrusive x-ray systems.
The seized drugs and the packages containing delivery information are subsequently sent to ICE Homeland Security Investigations for further investigation.
Fentanyl is flooding the streets of America and claiming the lives of tens of thousands of Americans. That’s the real national security threat. Securing our border by re-allocating defense resources to border security and putting troops on the border is a must. Continuing to maintain the US’s overseas empire at this point is the height of political negligence.
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