David J. Bier and Sahana Krishnamurthy
On September 2, the US military conducted a strike on a small boat near Venezuela believed to be carrying illegal drugs, resulting in the deaths of 11 individuals on board. In a statement, President Trump claimed the crew was made up of members of the Venezuelan gang Tren de Aragua, and later released a video showing drone footage of the attack. On September 15, his administration killed three more people on another boat in the Caribbean.
This is the latest in a long line of tactics used by the administration to reignite their preferred narrative: foreign drug cartels and criminal gangs are mainly responsible for funneling fentanyl through our borders and fueling America’s drug crisis. President Trump continues to blame immigrants and foreign gangs for the problem because it benefits his political agenda. But the government’s own data tell a different story; in Fiscal Year 2024, four out of five convicted drug traffickers were US citizens, according to updated conviction data from the US Sentencing Commission.
US Citizens Dominate Drug Trafficking
US citizens still made up 78 percent of offenders (9,362 out of 12,004 convictions nationwide). In other words, Americans dominate all drug trafficking convictions, not just fentanyl. The idea that illegal immigrants are the primary drivers of the problem simply doesn’t match reality; US citizens remain the clear majority of those convicted of drug trafficking. As the figure below shows, US citizens clearly outnumber all other groups combined.
Even in the Southwest border districts, where political rhetoric claims that “foreign cartels” are flooding the country with illegal drugs, Americans still account for nearly three-quarters of convictions (72 percent). In districts along the Gulf of Mexico and the Caribbean, which have garnered extra attention after the recent strike on a Venezuelan vessel, US citizens also remain the largest group of convictions. The data clearly show that drug trafficking in the United States is overwhelmingly domestic in nature.
When focusing specifically on fentanyl, the pattern remains consistent. Across the country, US citizens account for more than 80 percent of fentanyl convictions. Along the Southwest border, citizens remain the largest group by far (77 percent), and in districts near the Caribbean—often mentioned in discussions about foreign smuggling networks—nearly 90 percent of traffickers are Americans. These findings challenge the idea that fentanyl smuggling is mostly foreign-driven; the government’s own data show that US citizens are the primary traffickers.
US Citizens Have Grown in Importance for Fentanyl Trafficking
Drug trafficking organizations hire US citizens because they are guaranteed the right of entry into the United States and are subject to less scrutiny at ports than individuals without citizenship. This is particularly important for fentanyl trafficking, which is so potent that it can be easily concealed. From 2018 to 2024, US citizens accounted for 3,058 of the 3,874 convicted fentanyl traffickers in southwest border districts (78.9 percent). The graph below clearly shows how the number of US citizens involved in fentanyl trafficking has increased much more rapidly than that of other traffickers since 2018.
Not surprisingly, given this demographic breakdown, the vast majority of fentanyl is seized at legal ports of entry, not between the ports (where people cross illegally). The graph below breaks down fentanyl seizures by location. From FY 2015 to 2025, 85 percent of all fentanyl was seized at ports of entry. An additional 4 percent was seized at vehicle checkpoints on highways after the ports. Only 11 percent was seized by Border Patrol on patrol, and many of those seizures also resulted from vehicle stops.
Conclusion
Policymakers need to stop pretending that immigration enforcement and drone strikes are solutions to America’s drug crisis. Recent actions by the Trump administration—killing drug suspects, expanding his mass deportation agenda by deporting immigrants to foreign prisons without due process, and treating asylum seekers as scapegoats—blatantly ignore the evidence. The government’s own data show that US citizens are the overwhelming majority of traffickers—whether nationwide, at the southern border, or in the Caribbean. Cracking down on immigration or foreign drug boats will not change that fact.
If the goal is to save lives, we must shift our focus to reducing demand: legalize fentanyl test strips, eliminate outdated restrictions on methadone, allow doctors to treat addiction without fear of prosecution, and reschedule diamorphine for medical use. Other countries have adopted these reforms and achieved much better results. None of them solved the crisis by restricting immigration.
America’s drug crisis is overwhelmingly made in America for American consumers, and no amount of immigration theater will change that fact. Now is the time for Congress to take action; Americans are dying every day because our leaders choose to listen to political rhetoric, not facts.