TCT-IMM-017 · Drugs
Fentanyl trafficking is mainly an illegal-migration-between-ports problem
Statement and context
“We’re losing 300,000 people a year to fentanyl that comes through our border.”
2025-01-21, White House press availability, Washington, D.C.; this claim often appears alongside references to migrants crossing illegally.
What the evidence shows
The death total is overstated (see IMM-016). Fentanyl from Mexico is a dominant source of the U.S. illicit supply, but CBP data show the great majority of southwest-border fentanyl seizures occur at legal ports of entry, frequently in vehicles driven by U.S. citizens—not in the possession of migrants crossing between ports. Seizure shares are not a complete census of undetected trafficking, so the careful conclusion concerns the observed enforcement data, not every successful shipment.
False
Sources and attribution
Tracker research synthesis; inspect the linked evidence and research record.