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  3. Fentanyl

Combating Fentanyl

DHS is on the frontlines fighting against cartels and Transnational Criminal Organizations (TCOs) that are flooding our communities with illicit synthetic drugs, like fentanyl.

Fiscal Year 2024 Year to Date Highlights:

Seized over 27,000 lbs of illicit fentanyl. Arrested over 3,600 subjects connected to fentanyl Criminal Networks.
Seized over 2,200 pill presses. Initiated 5,874 narcotics-related investigations at HSI.

Data applies to October 1, 2023, to June 30, 2024.

DHS, through its component agencies U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) and Homeland Security Investigations (HSI) and in coordination with Intelligence & Analysis (I&A) and the Science & Technology Directorate (S&T), has stopped more illicit fentanyl and arrested more individuals for fentanyl-related crimes in fiscal years 2022 and 2023 than in the previous five years combined. We are doing this through enforcement actions, including seizures of fentanyl and precursor chemicals, along with stopping southbound guns and money, and supporting prosecutions to prevent future illicit acts.

DHS and its components are focused on enforcement actions, partnerships, technologies, and capacity-building in four areas:

Breaking up drug cartels and supply chains globally

DHS is leading the federal effort to combat fentanyl internationally, through information-sharing, multinational enforcement operations, and global cooperation and partnerships.

Recent Efforts

  • In April 2024, CBP launched Operation Plaza Spike to target plaza bosses and cartels that facilitate the flow of fentanyl and its precursors. In July 2024, CBP expanded the operation to El Paso and Juarez.
  • In June 2024, HSI indicted 47 alleged members of an Imperial Valley-based, Sinaloa Cartel-linked fentanyl distribution network; and in July, HSI helped execute the arrest on U.S. soil of the de facto head of the Sinaloa Cartel.
  • Under President Biden’s leadership, the U.S. has stepped up counternarcotics cooperation with key government partners, including China, India, Mexico, and Canada – and launched the Global Coalition to Address Synthetic Drug Threats, which unites more than 140 countries in the fight against drug trafficking cartels and illicit finance.
  • DHS participates in the National Security Council-led Counternarcotics Working Group with China to disrupt the manufacture and flow of illicit synthetic drugs, delivering on the commitments made during President Biden’s meeting with President Xi in November 2023.
  • DHS also contributes to the Trilateral Fentanyl Committee with the Governments of Mexico and Canada.
  • HSI partners with vetted foreign law enforcement officials and prosecutors in Transnational Criminal Investigative Units (TCIUs), which support investigations and prosecutions abroad. HSI has established 16 TCIUs worldwide. In FY 2023, efforts by the Mexico TCIU resulted in the seizure of 64,138 pounds of precursor chemicals and more than 59 criminal arrests.
  • We are working with shippers and private industry to provide more data to CBP. The Section 321 Data Pilot helps us work more closely with non-traditional trade partners to identify and interdict illicit shipments in small packages, without inhibiting cross-border e-commerce.
  • DHS has partnered with countries like the United Kingdom, Netherlands, Belgium, France as well as New Zealand and Australia in addition to Europol and Interpol to share information and intelligence to disrupt illicit movement of precursor chemicals.
  • DHS participates in World Customs Organization (WCO) meetings to advocate for the issuance of global customs policy standards and practices relating to synthetic drugs, consistent with those established by and in conjunction with the United Nations Office of Drugs and Crime (UNODC) and/or the International Narcotics Control Board (INCB).

Intercepting drugs and chemicals at our borders and ports of entry

DHS personnel is on the front lines to detect and prevent fentanyl and its precursor chemicals from flowing into our country.

More than 90% of interdicted fentanyl is stopped at Ports of Entry (POEs), where cartels attempt to smuggle it primarily in vehicles driven by U.S. citizens. CBP and HSI throughout the past two years have run operations that mobilized hundreds of personnel – CBP officers, special agents, import specialists, and intelligence analysts – through surges and deployments at Southwest Border POEs, airports, express consignment facilities, international mail facilities, container stations, and warehouses across the country.

  • Launched in October 2023,  in Southern California, Operation Apollo is a CBP counter-fentanyl operation that disrupts drug and chemical supplies, collects and shares intelligence, and leverages valuable state and local law enforcement partnerships. Operation Apollo expanded into Arizona in April 2024. In July, CBP announced Operation Apollo X to expand that kind of collaboration to El Paso, Texas.
  • Other recent operations include:
    • Operation Blue Lotus, launched in March 2023, surged CBP and HSI resources to Southwest Border POEs and worked with state, local, Tribal, and territorial partners to expose networks. Operation Four Horsemen was a complementary United States Border Patrol (USBP) operation to stop fentanyl between POEs and at checkpoints near the border. As a result of these two operations, DHS seized nearly 10,000 pounds of fentanyl, and more than 10,000 pounds of other narcotics like cocaine and methamphetamines.
    • Operation Artemis, a collaboration between CBP and HSI, targeted the illicit fentanyl supply chain, leveraging multidisciplined interagency "jump teams" at strategic locations. The four months Operation Artemis led to over 900 seizures, including over 13,000 pounds of fentanyl precursor chemicals.
    • Operation Rolling Wave surged inbound inspections at Southwest Border checkpoints, covering every sector and employing predictive analysis and intelligence sharing.

Keeping Fentanyl Out of our communities

DHS is partnering with federal, state, and local stakeholders to share information and track and disrupt fentanyl networks within our communities. In addition to collaborations like those described in Operation Apollo above, DHS works with state, local, territorial, and tribal partners in a variety of ways:

  • DHS is a department of partnerships, and sharing information with state, local, tribal, and territorial law enforcement and community partners is fundamental to our efforts. State, local, tribal, territorial, and international law enforcement are also in integral part of the success of DHS task forces, most significantly HSI’s Border Enforcement Security Task Force (BEST). The primary mission of HSI’s BEST is to combat emerging and existing TCOs by employing the full range of federal, state, local, tribal, and international law enforcement authorities and resources in the fight to identify, investigate, disrupt, and dismantle these organizations at every level of operation. BESTs eliminate the barriers between federal and local investigations (access to both federal and state prosecutors) and close the gap with international partners in multinational criminal investigations.
  • State, local, tribal, and territorial law enforcement also support efforts to disrupt TCOs by nominating individuals to the Transnational Organized Crime (TOC) watchlist through DHS Office of Intelligence and Analysis (I&A). The TOC watchlist, maintained by the FBI, is a list of individuals known or reasonably suspected to be involved in transnational organized crime.
  • Every year, DHS provides a significant level of support through preparedness grants to help state, local, tribal, and territorial governments, nonprofit agencies, and the private sector. Among those grants, Operation Stonegarden provides tens of millions of dollars to enhance cooperation among law enforcement agencies to jointly enhance security along the United States land and water borders. In the last four fiscal years, DHS has provided on average nearly $90 million per year to community partners through Operation Stonegarden.

Identifying and deploying new technology to fight fentanyl

DHS is working on developing new technology to support better detection and apprehension of synthetic drugs and their precursors.

  • Non-Intrusive Inspection: We are dramatically expanding non-intrusive inspection (NII) technology at our southwest border to screen and detect not only drugs, but also currency, guns, ammunition, and illegal merchandise, as well as people being smuggled or trafficked into the country, while minimally impacting the flow of legitimate travel and commerce. By installing 123 new large-scale scanners at multiple POEs along the southwest border, CBP will increase its inspection capacity of passenger vehicles from two percent to 40 percent, and of cargo vehicles from 17 percent to 70 percent.
  • Forward Operating Laboratories: CBP is operating 16 Forward Operating Laboratories to provide onsite, rapid testing for fentanyl to frontline personnel. A process that once would have taken weeks now takes seconds for quicker law enforcement actions, prosecutions, and intelligence collection.
  • Artificial Intelligence and Machine Learning at Ports of Entry: CBP is innovating with the responsible use of Artificial Intelligence at our POEs. This year alone, machine learning models that help CBP Officers determine which suspicious vehicles and passengers to refer to secondary screening have led to 240 seizures, which include thousands of pounds of cocaine, heroin, methamphetamine, and fentanyl.
  • HSI Strategic Network Dismantlement Project: HSI is using Artificial Intelligence to illuminate fentanyl networks, known and unknown to authorities, operating throughout the U.S. and abroad. The HSI Strategic Network Dismantlement Project partners data engineers and data scientists with HSI investigators who leverage the HSI-owned RAVEN platform to analyze raw data, derive meaningful investigative insights, and enable disruptions of the global fentanyl supply chain.
  • HSI Innovation Lab: HSI is utilizing the HSI Innovation Lab to provide data analytics and cutting-edge technologies (machine learning and artificial intelligence) to combat fentanyl.

To report suspicious criminal activity related to narcotics smuggling, call the HSI Tip Line at 1-877-4-HSI-TIP.

Last Updated: 11/01/2024
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