The American Immigration Council is a non-profit, non-partisan organization. President Donald Trump signed The Halt All Lethal Trafficking of Fentanyl Act into law on July 16, 2025, aimed at strengthening prison sentences for fentanyl traffickers. All fentanyl-related substances, including copycat versions, will now be classified as a Schedule I drug.
When signing the legislation, the president blamed his favorite boogeyman for the rise in fentanyl overdoses in the United States: migrants illegally crossing the southern border.
Trump claimed that the Biden administration’s border policies “flooded our country with fentanyl and with people that shouldn’t be here,” repeating a myth that has largely imbedded itself into the American consciousness.
But the truth of the matter is far different: it’s U.S. citizens—not migrants—who are smuggling the majority of fentanyl into the country.
Recent analysis from the American Immigration Council confirmed that roughly four in five people apprehended for smuggling fentanyl into the United States at the southern border between October 2018 and June 2024 were U.S. citizens. The rest were largely individuals with visas, border crossing cards, or other permission to enter the United States lawfully at a port of entry.
How Is Fentanyl Making It Into the United States?
The vast majority of fentanyl is smuggled into the United States at ports of entry—not via cross-border tunnels, drones, catapults, or on foot.
As the head of the Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) testified to Congress in 2023, “Our investigations do tell us that the vast majority of fentanyl is coming in the ports of entry.”
According to an analysis of nearly 700 U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) press releases from January 2021 to March 2024, just 10 smuggling incidents occurred between ports of entry when migrants were stopped on foot or fentanyl was found abandoned. In contrast, 519 entered the U.S. via ports of entry.
There is little evidence to suggest migrants are bringing fentanyl across the border on foot—or that migration is linked to fentanyl at all. Migration has risen and fallen with no correlation between drug seizures.
Who Is Smuggling Fentanyl Into the United States?
Transnational criminal organizations tend to use U.S. citizens for fentanyl smuggling because they attract the least amount of attention at the border, often disguising themselves as ordinary travelers.
Data obtained through the Freedom of Information Act found that most people arrested for smuggling fentanyl at ports of entry are U.S. citizens, accounting for 81.2% of all seizures along the southwest border from fiscal years 2019 to June 2024.
The majority of fentanyl is brought in through passenger vehicles. Again, criminal networks prefer to use passenger vehicles driven by U.S. citizens, traveling through ports of entry, because it draws the least amount of scrutiny at the border.
Passenger vehicles typically receive less individual attention simply because of the volume of traffic passing through the border each day. For example, on the average day in March 2025, a total of 204,241 personal vehicles carrying 361,764 passengers crossed the U.S.-Mexico border. The sheer volume of cars—in addition to the trucks, buses, and trains crossing each day—makes it impossible to thoroughly inspect every single vehicle and individual for drugs.
Addressing the Fentanyl Crisis
The fentanyl crisis and migration management are different issues and require different solutions. Rather than erroneously blaming migrants for the flow of fentanyl coming into the United States, we ought to pool resources where they’re needed most: ports of entry.
Increasing screening technology at ports of entry will allow CBP officers to conduct more inspections, catch more fentanyl concealed in vehicles, and reduce opportunities for smugglers.
This can be combined with public health measures inside the United States that help tackle addiction and law enforcement measures aimed at reducing the power of transnational criminal organizations.
