Second Mexican War - Trump Punitive Expedition
Three articles — in Rolling Stone, Politico, and Semafor — traced the rise of the proposal from obscurity to the party’s highest levels, finding ample evidence of the idea’s popularity in the GOP ranks. However, during his first presidency and afterward, Trump proposed aggressive measures to combat drug cartels operating in Mexico.
Trump's administration implemented strict policies on immigration and border control, including the construction of a border wall and deploying U.S. military personnel to support border enforcement. Trump considered designating Mexican drug cartels as terrorist organizations, which could theoretically open the door to using U.S. military force against them. Reports have suggested that Trump discussed or floated the idea of using U.S. military capabilities to target drug cartels in Mexico. However, such an action would require coordination with the Mexican government, as Mexico is a sovereign nation.
Vice President-elect J.D. Vance, the incoming National Security Advisor Mike Waltz, then a congressman for Florida, and Tom Homan, set to become “border czar,” also proposed that Washington invade Mexico.
On 12 January 2023, Reps. Dan Crenshaw and Mike Waltz introduced legislation creating the Authorization for Use of Military Force (AUMF) to target Mexican drug cartels facilitating the fentanyl crisis at America’s southern border. “The cartels are war with us – poisoning more than 80,000 Americans with fentanyl every year, creating a crisis at our border, and turning Mexico into a failed narco-state,” Rep. Crenshaw said. “It’s time we directly target them. My legislation will put us at war with the cartels by authorizing the use of military force against the cartels. We cannot allow heavily armed and deadly cartels to destabilize Mexico and import people and drugs into the United States. We must start treating them like ISIS – because that is who they are.”
“The situation at our southern border has become untenable for our law enforcement personnel largely due to the activities spurred by the heavily armed and well financed Sinola and Jalisco cartels,” said Rep. Waltz. “It’s time to go on offense. Not only are these paramilitary transnational criminal organizations responsible for killing an unprecedented number of Americans, but are actively undermining our sovereignty by destabilizing our border and waging war against US law enforcement and the Mexican military. an AUMF would give the President sophisticated military cyber, intelligence, and surveillance resources to disrupt cartel operations that are endangering Americans. The US was successful in assisting the Columbian government dismantle cartels in the 1990s and must do the same now.”
The Authorization for Use of Military Force (AUMF) allows the President to use military force against cartels based on their fentanyl trafficking, production, and distribution; their use of force against US law enforcement and/or military, law enforcement and/or military of a neighboring country, and/or to gain control of territory to use for their criminal enterprise. The AUMF specifically names the biggest cartels operating in Mexico, specifically Sinaloa and Jalisco New Generation Cartel – the main importers of fentanyl into the United States. This AUMF also establishes limitations that prohibit the use of military force against foreign persons outside the territory of the United States to ensure the civil liberties of U.S. citizens are protected and includes a sunset five years after enactment to ensure the war against cartels does not become an endless war.
Sen. Graham, Lindsey [R-SC] (I on 29 March 2023) introduced "Ending the Notorious, Aggressive, and Remorseless Criminal Organizations and Syndicates Act of 2023" the Ending the NARCOS Act of 2023. This bill designates nine specified drug cartels as foreign terrorist organizations. (Among other things, such a designation allows the Department of the Treasury to require financial institutions to block transactions involving the organization.) The bill also requires the Office of the Director of National Intelligence to establish an interagency task force on combating Mexican cartels and other transnational criminal organizations.
The national security of the United States, along with the health and safety of the citizens of the United States, is under attack by Mexican cartels and other transnational criminal organizations that engage in acts of terrorism to exploit the borders of the United States and further their unlawful business of producing and importing illicitly manufactured fentanyl, a substance that kills hundreds of thousands of people in the United States each year, methamphetamine, and other controlled substances.
Fentanyl is a synthetic opioid that is up to 50 times stronger than heroin and 100 times stronger than morphine, and some fentanyl-related substances can have even greater potency. Although pharmaceutical fentanyl is prescribed by doctors to treat severe pain, illicitly manufactured fentanyl and fentanyl-related substances are created using precursor chemicals that are predominantly imported from China and distributed through illegal drug markets, most commonly by Mexican cartels across the southern border.
According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, nearly 110,000 people in the United States died during fiscal year 2022 from drug overdoses. Approximately 66 percent of those deaths in fiscal year 2022 related to illicitly manufactured fentanyl. In December 2022, the Washington Post reported that, from 2019 to 2021, fatal fentanyl overdoses surged 94 percent and an estimated 196 people in the United States are now dying each day from the drug, which is the equivalent of a fully loaded Boeing 757–200 crashing and killing everyone on board every day.
The single largest loss of life resulting from a foreign attack on United States soil was the September 11 terrorist attacks, which killed 2,977 people, and fentanyl overdoses cause the equivalent of a new September 11 nearly every 2 weeks. In fiscal year 2022, the United States suffered more fentanyl-related deaths than gun- and auto-related deaths combined. Illicit fentanyl is now the number one cause of death among people in the United States between the ages of 18 and 45.
A 2017 analysis, accounting for the costs of health care, criminal justice, lost productivity and social and family services, estimated that the total cost of the drug epidemic of the United States facilitated by Mexican cartels and other transnational criminal organizations was more than $1,000,000,000,000 annually, or 5 percent of gross domestic product.
Law enforcement and immigration officers report that smugglers evade apprehension and successfully bring large quantities of fentanyl, methamphetamine, and other illicit drugs into the United States. Despite seizures both at and between ports of entry, like the recent seizure by U.S. Customs and Border Protection of nearly 54 pounds of fentanyl pills and 32 pounds of methamphetamine at the Andrade Port of Entry, domestic supply of these controlled substances indicate a massive amount of controlled substances are still pouring across the border.
The Federal Government possesses unutilized resources and lawful measures to combat the cartels through the designation of those groups as foreign terrorist organizations. Foreign terrorist organizations are foreign organizations that are designated by the Secretary of State in accordance with section 219 of the Immigration and Nationality Act (8 U.S.C. 1189).
The designation of organizations as foreign terrorist organizations plays a critical role in the fight against terrorism and is an effective means of curtailing support for terrorist activities and pressuring groups to get out of the terrorism business because such a designation gives law enforcement agencies and prosecutors greater powers to freeze the assets of an organization, to deny members of the organization entry into the United States, and to seek tougher punishments against those who provide material support to the organization.
Under section 219 of the Immigration and Nationality Act (8 U.S.C. 1189), the Secretary of State may designate an organization as a foreign terrorist organization if (A) the organization is a foreign organization; (B) the organization engages in terrorist activity or terrorism, or retains the capability and intent to engage in terrorist activity or terrorism; and (C) the terrorist activity or terrorism of the organization threatens the security of United States nationals or the national security of the United States.
Mexican cartels satisfy each of those three criteria, as they are foreign organizations based outside the United States, they engage in “terrorist activity” such as assassinations, kidnaping, or use of explosives and firearms, and their terrorist activities threaten the security of the United States and the people of the United States.
Mexican cartels and other transnational criminal organizations, as foreign organizations, make billions of dollars each year importing deadly drugs into the United States, especially fentanyl and methamphetamine, which results in the deaths of hundreds of thousands of people in the United States each year. United States Southern Command reports that criminal organizations, including drug cartels, in their Area of Responsibility generate an estimated annual revenue of approximately $300,000,000,000 more than 5-times the combined defense budget for the region, including Mexico.
The death and destruction caused by the illicit drug trade is not limited to overdoses and gang violence, rather, it extends to a significant proportion of nearly all other criminal activity in the United States, including burglary, carjacking, robbery, aggravated assault, domestic violence, felony traffic violations, and much more, and it also extends to drug addictions that often result in homelessness, suicide, human trafficking, child sex trafficking, broken families, birth defects, and other maladies that are devastating communities across the United States.
The national security threat posed by Mexican cartels and other transnational criminal organizations extends beyond the sale of fentanyl and other drugs, as these organizations have also shown a lethal willingness to protect their business by any means necessary, including organizing Armed Forces to fight both their rivals and the Government of Mexico, creating a dangerous and unstable situation on the southern border of the United States with innocent people of the United States caught in the crossfire.
The chaos and calamity caused by Mexican cartels and other transnational criminal organizations at the southern border teeters on all-out war, with the Government of Mexico deploying more than 200,000 Federal troops to fight the cartels, and even with that military presence, the kidnaping, decapitations, and terror continue, including on and near United States soil.
According to statistics of the United Nations, the homicide rate in the United States Southern Command’s Area of Responsibility was a staggering 15.7 per 100,000 in 2020, out of a global average of 5.6 per 100,000, no doubt due to the violence of transnational criminal organizations in the region. The Department of State has already recognized the reality of the terror caused by Mexican cartels, issuing its highest level of travel warning for all but 2 of Mexico’s 32 States due to increased threats of crime and kidnaping and having already named Colombia-based groups like the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia-People’s Army (FARC–EP), Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia-Segunda Marquetalia (FARC–SM), and the National Liberation Army (ELN) as foreign terrorist organizations.
There are already known links between transnational criminal organizations and designated foreign terrorist organizations, such as Hezbollah, al-Qaeda, Hamas, and the Islamic State. Existing counter-narcotics efforts under the Foreign Narcotics Kingpin Designation Act (21 U.S.C. 1901 et seq.), focusing on financial sanctions, and designating these organizations as foreign terrorist organizations are better methods for addressing the increasing violence and supply of deadly fentanyl and other drugs being shipped across the border.
Designating Mexican cartels and other transnational criminal organizations as foreign terrorist organizations would enable—
- use of section 1010A of the Controlled Substances Import and Export Act (21 U.S.C. 960a) to prosecute drug traffickers associated with these organizations for providing pecuniary support to a foreign terrorist organization;
- use of section 2339B of title 18, United States Code, to prosecute anyone who knowingly provides material support or resources to these organizations, including paying human traffickers or those who provide any logistical support or services to these organizations;
- use of such section 2339B to impose civil penalties on any financial institution that fails to freeze and report any funds in which these organizations have any interest; and
- through those statutes, the use of extraterritorial jurisdiction to target and prosecute foreign nationals involved with Mexican cartels and other transnational criminal organizations.
The following cartels, including any faction of such a cartel, associated forces, or subsequent groups, would be deemed to be foreign terrorist organizations pursuant to section 219 of the Immigration and Nationality Act (8 U.S.C. 1189):
- Sinaloa Cartel.
- Jalisco New Generation Cartel.
- Gulf Cartel.
- Los Zetas Cartel.
- Northeast Cartel.
- Juarez Cartel.
- Tijuana Cartel.
- Beltran-Leyva Cartel.
- La Familia Michoacana, also known as the Knight Templar Cartel.
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