- President Donald Trump has made border security a key initiative for his administration.
- He has pushed for a additional barriers on the US-Mexico border and for additional enforcement along the frontier.
- But such methods may still miss the influx of drugs Trump has said he will halt.
Reinforcing the southern border has been a high priority for President Donald Trump, who has promised since the early days of his campaign to construct additional barriers along the frontier.
This month, in an apparent response to an annual migrant caravan heading north through Mexico toward the US border, Trump announced that he would deploy the National Guard for additional security at the frontier — against both the unauthorized movement of people and the illicit transport of illegal drugs into the US.
"We're putting the National Guard and military at the border," Trump told reporters on Monday. "And we need a wall. Whether you're a Republican or Democrat, we need a wall, and it'll stop your drug flow. It'll knock the hell out of the drug flow, and it'll stop a lot of people that we don't want in this country from coming into our country."
US military personnel at the border will only be authorized to assist the Border Patrol with intelligence and surveillance and won't have the power to capture migrants. But it's questionable how much more additional enforcement they could provide.
The 2,000 to 4,000 troops Trump wants to deploy will arrive at a time when there are 30,012 border apprehensions a month, according to the Washington Office on Latin America. When George W. Bush deployed the National Guard to the border in 2006, there were 128,979 apprehensions at the border a month.
And based on reports from the US Drug Enforcement Administration and other government officials, more troops along the border may miss the mark when it comes to staunching the flow of illicit narcotics into the US.
"Mexican [transnational criminal organizations] transport the majority of illicit drugs into the United States across the [southwest border] using a wide array of smuggling techniques," the DEA said in its 2017 National Drug Threat Assessment. "The most common method employed by these TCOs involves transporting illicit drugs through US ports of entry in passenger vehicles with concealed compartments or commingled with legitimate goods on tractor trailers."
The 48 official land crossings that see the passage of millions of people, vehicles, and cargo every day — and are already staffed by law-enforcement and customs officials — also see the vast majority of illegal drug shipments.
Meth
The southwest border, which stretches from San Diego to Texas' Gulf coast, "remains the main entry point for the majority of methamphetamine entering the United States," the DEA said in its 2017 report.
"Methamphetamine seizures along the SWB increased 157 percent from CY 2012 (8,213 kg) to CY 2016 (21,121 kg). The majority (47%) of methamphetamine seized along the SWB in CY 2016 occurred in the San Diego corridor. Seizures increased in every corridor along the SWB."
Among the array of techniques smugglers use to conceal cargoes of meth are "human couriers commercial flights, parcel services, and commercial buses," according to the report. "Traffickers most commonly transport small, multikilogram shipments of methamphetamine in privately-owned vehicles."
Cocaine
The southwest border is "the key entry point for the majority of the cocaine entering the United States, according to US Customs and Border Protection data," the DEA report states.
"Traffickers most commonly smuggle cocaine into the United States via privately owned vehicles passing through ports of entry along the SWB. Cocaine is hidden amongst legitimate cargo on commercial trucks or secreted inside hidden compartments built within passenger vehicles."
Food and other perishable items are especially popular, especially because some goods, like raw fish, are pungent enough to conceal odors and deter curious customs officials. In one instance, Sinaloa cartel chief Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzman opened a cannery in Mexico to package cocaine in cans of chiles, which were labeled "Comadre Jalapeños."
"Commercial air smuggling is another important conveyance method for cocaine traffickers looking to smuggle cocaine from South America and the Caribbean into the United States," the DEA report adds. "This type of air smuggling has four different aspects to it: couriers, cargo, mail/express consignment, and internal conspiracy."
Couriers include people like airline passengers or crew members. Cargo shipments can range from a few kilos to a few tons hidden in commercial goods, like food or industrial equipment. Consignment shipments are more likely to move into and around the US in the mail. In other cases, airline or airport personnel on both ends of flights have conspired to traffic cocaine hidden in baggage or somewhere in an aircraft.
Heroin
"Most of the heroin smuggled into the United States is brought overland across the SWB," according to the DEA, which notes that most of that is produced in Mexico or South America. Lesser amounts of South American, Southwest Asian, or Southeast Asian heroin are "transported by couriers on commercial airlines."
"The majority of any heroin that we seize is not between the ports of entry," then-US Customs and Border Protection Commissioner Gil Kerlikowske told a Congressional committee in spring 2016.
"It's smuggled through the ports of entry, whether is in San Isidro or El Paso, or whether is at JFK airport. Heroin seizures almost predominantly are through the port of entry and either carried in a concealed part of a vehicle or carried by an individual."
"We don't get much heroin seized by border patrol coming through," he added. "I think just because there are a lot of risks to the smugglers and the difficulty of trying to smuggle it through."
The DEA reported that heroin is often commingled with other drugs during transport, meth in particular. "Most heroin smuggled across the border is transported in small, multikilogram loads, in privately-owned vehicles, usually through California," the DEA report said, citing CBP.
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