Sen. John Kennedy (R-LA) criticized the current administration for their border policies, stating that they have made every state into a border state. Kennedy’s comments came in a tweet from July 31, and referenced a Fox News article from June which detailed the issue of fentanyl pouring into the country and into many different states.
“The Biden admin’s refusal to enforce our nation’s laws is making every state a border state,” Kennedy said.
Fox News reported that the Drug Enforcement Agency (DEA) has said that most substances containing fentanyl find their way into the U.S. via the southern border and have named the drug network of the Mexican cartels as their top priority.
"The Jalisco new generation Cartel and the Sinaloa Cartel, these two cartels are driving the drug overdose epidemic,” Special Agent in Charge Brad Byerley of the New Orleans Field Division said.
According to X (formerly Twitter), Kennedy referenced the Fox News article, which states that New Orleans, the largest city in Kennedy’s state of Louisiana, is a gateway for drugs entering the U.S., despite being 700 miles away from the U.S.-Mexico border.
According to the article, this is the case due to the Interstates 10, 55, 30, 40 and 65 all running through or around New Orleans and connecting to many other major cities across the country.
The article said that as a part of Operation Last Mile, from May 2022-May 2023, more than 147,000 fentanyl pills and 63 pounds of fentanyl powder were seized by the New Orleans Field Division, enough to wipe out the whole metro area of New Orleans, Byerley said.
Fox also reported that the Mexican cartels have not stopped at using interstates, but have also exploited social media for drug transportation, which the DEA refers to as the "super highway.” Operation Last Mile successfully tracked drug operations across 45 diverse social media platforms.
"Anyone with access to social media can be a victim of the Mexican cartel. It has totally changed the game as far as how these narcotics traffickers do business. Fentanyl is lethal, but the cartels don't care because they know there are another 302 million people out on social media," Byerley said.
