An alarming congressional testimony on April 10 exposed Mexican drug cartels' operations on Native American reservations across the United States, indicating locations close to the Mexican border.
The hearing revealed as per the testimonies that the criminal groups are taking advantage of President Joe Biden's open border policies, using the porous 62-mile stretch of border between Mexico and the lands of the Tohono O'odham Nation in southern Arizona to smuggle illegal drugs and conduct human trafficking operations.
These cartels are also allegedly hauling their cargo north to Native American communities miles away in Wyoming and even Montana. (Related: Mexican drug cartels fighting over control of Montana, "the last best place "to sell illicit substances in America.)
According to Committee Chairman Rep. Bruce Westerman (R-AR), the cartels have set up extensive networks within these communities to distribute illegal substances, including fentanyl and methamphetamine. This has led to heightened levels of violence, crime and drug overdoses devastating Indian country. The Sinaloa and Jalisco New Generation cartels have been pinpointed for targeting Indian reservations, exploiting the rural and often law enforcement-free areas for higher profits.
Also, the Tohono O'odham Nation in south-central Arizona, which has approximately 34,000 members across a 2.8-million-acre reservation, was disclosed to be the significant route for the illegal operations. The reservation's challenging terrain of mountains and deserts complicates patrol efforts, making it a strategic point for smuggling operations. The Drug Enforcement Administration already recognized it as a high-intensity drug trafficking area.
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During the hearing, Tohono O'odham Chairman Verlon Jose complained that his tribe spends about $3 million of its tribal funds on border security and enforcement. He also testified in front of a congressional panel that in 2023, the nation's tribal police responded to over 100,000 incidents involving drug seizures, illegal immigration and other border-related criminal activity. Also, the tribe's law enforcement has spent nearly $6 million on over 1,500 migrant death investigations and recoveries without any federal financial assistance.
"Criminal cartel activity has exacerbated the negative effect of drug and migrant smuggling on the Nation," Jose said and added, "smugglers have held tribal families hostage, damaged and stolen property, and recruited tribal youth to engage in smuggling activity."
He also told federal lawmakers that the border wall is "particularly ineffective in remote geographic areas like our homelands, where it can easily be circumvented by climbing over, tunneling under, or sawing through it."
Bryce Peck, member of the Tribal Executive Board of the Fort Peck Indian Reservation in Montana, which is home to several bands of Assiniboine, Lakota and Dakota peoples, added in his own testimony that there is no doubt that Mexican drug cartels are responsible for a drug crisis that has infested every corner of the tribes' community.
"They have found their way to the Fort Peck Indian Reservation and embedded themselves in our communities and our families," Kirk said.
Mexican cartel threatens tribal leaders
Jeffrey Stiffarm, president of the Fort Belknap Indian Community in Montana, refused to name his fellow leader who backed out. But he said the threat seemed real and credible, telling lawmakers just how much power the drug lords have accumulated. According to him, a Mexican drug cartel used death threats to force the unnamed tribal leader to back out of testifying to Congress.
"One thing that we seem to overlook all the time is the threats, the death threats we get from cartel leaders," Stiffarm told the House Natural Resources Committee. "We had the tribal leader from Montana, that declined to testify here today because he received death threats that he was going to testify."
The revelation that cartel threats had interfered with lawmakers' business shocked the members. "The cartels have threatened them with death," Westerman said. "That's horrible to think that an American citizen has been threatened by a foreign cartel if they come to Congress and testify about what they're doing." The committee said it had contacted other potential witnesses who declined to testify for safety reasons.
As per Stiffarm, his community is in northern Montana, far from the southern border but the Mexican cartels control the drug activity and everything around it. "We're fighting a losing battle and the cartels are winning. The drug dealers are winning. They're overrunning our reservations," he said.
"It shows these aren't benign small-time organizations," said Jessica Vaughan, an expert at the Center for Immigration Studies who filled in as a witness after the tribal leader backed out. "These are criminal enterprises that are actively seeking to expand, that are attracted by the opportunity to sell drugs in the United States and are willing to use violent tactics to succeed."
Vaughan noted that this is a problem on so many levels. "It's a problem that they've been able to infiltrate these communities and it's a problem that these public officials feel so intimidated by them. This is creating a huge threat to our civil society that has only been very isolated and rare in the United States of America before now," she added.
Check out DrugCartels.news to read more news about how Mexican drug cartels leverage Biden's open border policies.
Watch the video below where Robert F. Kennedy Jr. reveals that Mexican drug cartels run America's immigration policy.
This video is from the GalacticStorm channel on Brighteon.com.
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