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Weekend Reads
China and its Mexican cartel partners kill over 100,000 Americans and cost the United States $1.5 trillion each year by manufacturing fentanyl and smuggling it over America’s southern border.
This is a national security threat, not just a law enforcement matter. President and CEO John Walters and Distinguished Fellow Bill Barr explain how President Donald Trump’s tariff and border policies will help tackle the problem head-on.
Key Insights
1. Look to the source of the problem.
Real progress requires eliminating the drug supply at its source. Here the US has a golden opportunity because the supply chain for drugs poisoning America has become highly concentrated and vulnerable. It depends entirely on illegal activities in two countries—the manufacture of illicit drugs in Communist China, and drug processing and distribution operations in the cartels’ safe havens in Mexico.
2. Use economic leverage against China and Mexico.
All these illegal activities are carried out with—and indeed require—the connivance or willful blindness of the host governments. As President Trump’s announced tariffs show, the US has the tools and leverage to compel China and Mexico to shut down these operations. Doing this would strike a decisive blow: once these operations are dismantled, it would be impossible to replicate them elsewhere at anywhere near their current scale.
3. Treat cartels like terrorist organizations.
Eliminating the cartels will require a joint campaign through which the US engages in direct action against the cartels, using a range of our law enforcement, intelligence, and military capabilities. The Mexican cartels are more like foreign terrorist groups than they are the American mafia—and it is heartening that President Trump has signed an executive order designating them as such. It is time to confront them as national security threats, not a law enforcement matter.
Quotes may be edited for clarity and length.
Go Deeper
Bill Barr discusses the second Trump administration’s efforts to secure the southern border and eliminate cartel outposts inside the US.
By fueling the fentanyl epidemic, the Chinese Communists are carrying out the most devastating foreign attack on the United States in American history. John Walters argues that America needs to restore deterrence to end this biochemical attack.
Mexico cannot—and will not—defeat the cartels on its own. “American leadership is needed to help Mexico break free,” writes Bill Barr in the Wall Street Journal.
Act Now
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