Opinion
By Larry Keane
Mexico’s $10 billion lawsuit against U.S. firearm manufacturers has a sick and twisted wrinkle.
The Biden administration’s “open-border” policy is funding the same violent narco-terrorists that plague Mexico with violence, murders, corruption and sending illicit drugs into America.
Mexican officials claim that U.S. firearm manufacturers are trafficking firearms south, which arms these murderous cartels. That’s an absurd allegation. Yet, a cursory look at how the cartels are expanding their illicit enterprises to include human trafficking shows how the open-border policies are fueling not just rampant crime in Mexico but also the illegal firearm trafficking that’s arming the cartels.
Mexico’s lawsuit was given new life when the U.S. Court of Appeals for the First Circuit overturned a lower court’s decision that earlier dismissed the case on the grounds that the Protection of Lawful Commerce In Arms Act (PLCAA) prevents frivolous lawsuits against firearm manufacturers for the crimes committed by remote third parties. Mexico’s claims that U.S. manufacturers are complicit in funneling guns illegally across the border is irrational at best, if not insidious.
Corrupt Mexican Government
Mexican President Andrés Manuel López Obrador’s handling of the narco-terrorism crisis is alarming. Instead of confronting the cartels, he’s adopted a “hugs, not bullets” strategy when he ran for office in 2018. The Texas Public Policy Foundation called the policy “hugs for thugs” and wrote that President López Obrador’s never clearly defined what that meant, only throwing out a catchphrase. He doubled down on that ill-defined policy in 2022. Today, Mexico still suffers from the cartels that know only violence.
“But [President López Obrador] has never had a cross word for narcos,” Texas Public Policy Foundation wrote of the Mexican president.
That deafening silence is because there is mounting evidence, even as President López Obrador prepares for a re-election bid, that he is corrupt. He’s been bought-and-paid-for by the Mexican drug cartels to the tune of millions. The liberal publication Pro Publica reported that U.S. Drug Enforcement Agency (DEA) agents “uncovered what they believed was substantial evidence that major cocaine traffickers had funneled some $2 million to his first presidential campaign.”
The Mexican government corruption is so thorough and rampant that the DEA told Pro Publica there was no divorcing government officials from the criminal cartels.
“The corruption is so much a part of the fabric of drug trafficking in Mexico that there’s no way you can pursue the drug traffickers without going after the politicians and the military and police officials who support them,” said Raymond Donovan to Pro Publica, who recently retired as the DEA’s operations chief.
Falsely Blaming U.S. Manufacturers
There’s no doubt that Mexican drug cartels are arming themselves to the teeth. The illegal trafficking of firearms to Mexico is hardly the doing of the firearm industry. The firearm industry is among the most-heavily regulated industries in America. Firearm manufacturers follow the laws and regulations that govern production, distribution and sale of their products. That includes filing production reports with the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF). Any firearm destined for foreign countries must be approved for export by the Commerce Department, which includes 100 percent end-user checks. No other export commodity in America is subject to that level of scrutiny. Add to that, there’s only one firearm retailer in all of Mexico, and that’s deep within the walls of a Mexican Army base in the heart of Mexico City.
Firearm sales at retail in America are subject to an FBI National Instant Criminal Background Check System (NICS) verification and the buyer filling out and signing the ATF Form 4473 that attests they are the true intended recipient of that firearm.
If there were wholesale efforts by U.S. manufacturers to skirt these laws and regulations, ATF would yank the licenses and press criminal charges in a heartbeat. The Biden administration is pressing a “whole of government” approach to attacking the firearm industry. Never once has there been a hint or allegation by the ATF that firearm manufacturers are complicit in illegal firearm trafficking. In fact, ATF has long stressed that firearm retailers are the primary source of information that leads to firearm trafficking investigations, even current ATF Director Steven Dettelbach says ATF relies upon retailers who he has called the “first line of defense.” During the Obama administration, ATF sent Gun Runner Impact Team (GRITS) to the border looking to find retailer engaged in making illegal sales. They found none, unsurprisingly.
Cartel Human Trafficking Raking Billions
Yet, there’s reason to believe that the Biden administration’s border policies, and President Joe Biden’s refusal to seal the border, is actually funding illegal firearm trafficking and exacerbating violent crime in Mexico. That’s because the narco-terrorist cartels have found a new funding stream.
U.S. Rep. Anthony D’Esposito (R-N.Y.) wrote in The Hill, “Transnational criminal organizations, or cartels, are being empowered by the lawlessness at the Southwest border under the watch of Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas. Open borders facilitate the cartels’ billion-dollar business of human smuggling, drug trafficking, and human trafficking.”
Human trafficking has become a lucrative business for the drug cartels. U.S. House of Representatives Homeland Security Committee Chairman Mark Green (R-Tenn.) told Fox News in January that narco-terrorists earn $32 million each week in just one 245-mile stretch of the U.S.-Mexico border in Texas. “That’s just trafficking humans. That’s not counting the fentanyl they’re pouring into this country,” he said.
Rep. Carlos Gonzales told Fox Business in July 2023 that Mexican drug cartels earn over $1 billion each month through human trafficking and smuggling operations. Chairman Green said in a July 2023 U.S. House Homeland Security Committee hearing, “In 2021 alone, the cartels made an estimated $13 billion just from human trafficking and smuggling.”
Open Border Facilitation
Those are staggering figures, which are enriching criminal cartels, victimizing millions and funding the illicit criminal activities on both sides of the U.S.-Mexico border. The Biden administration, however, ignores the role that their misguided border policies play in funding violence and crime. Meanwhile, they’re content to allow Mexico to abuse U.S. courts to attack the firearm industry.
After all, this isn’t something new for President Biden. He was vice president when the ill-fated and illegal gun running scheme run by the ATF, called Operation Fast & Furious, allowed over 2,000 firearms to be illegally trafficked from the U.S. to Mexico and failed to track or account for them on the other side of the border. That was largely seen as an attempt by the Obama-Biden administration, including U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder, as an attempt to smear U.S. firearm manufacturers with the blame for crimes in which they had no part. The scheme fell apart when ATF whistleblowers blew the lid on the illegal operation after it cost the life of U.S. Border Patrol Agent Brian Terry. The U.S. government has still never apologized to the Terry family for Operation Fast & Furious.
Mexico is trying to pin the blame for their own ineptness, corruption and cooperation with narco-terrorists by dragging U.S. manufacturers into court with a bogus $10 billion claim.
It might be time that judges take a closer look at not just the Mexican government’s corruption but also how the Biden administration’s “open border” policies encourage human smuggling that is funding and fueling crime in both Mexico and the United States. If the U.S. Supreme Court allows Mexico’s case to proceed to discovery, rest assured America’s firearm industry will put the Mexican government’s corruption and the Biden administration’s ineptness on trial.
About The National Shooting Sports Foundation
NSSF is the trade association for the firearm industry. Its mission is to promote, protect and preserve hunting and shooting sports. Formed in 1961, NSSF has a membership of thousands of manufacturers, distributors, firearm retailers, shooting ranges, sportsmen’s organizations, and publishers nationwide. For more information, visit nssf.org
