Drug Trafficking

Secretary Marco Rubio delivers remarks to the press from the press briefing room at the Department of State in Washington, D.C., December 19, 2025 . (Official State Department photo by Freddie Everett)

The Trump administration is weighing whether to designate Brazil’s two largest drug gangs as terrorist organizations, a step that could expand the U.S. sanctions toolkit to include financial restrictions on the groups and their associates.

Drug dealer Giving drugs in a plastic bag, cocaine,heroin,speed or other drugs on dark black background, addiction,drugs,junky,criminal concept copy space

Two Chinese pharmaceutical firms and six Chinese nationals are facing charges after prosecutors said they were part of a drug-trafficking network that provided material support to the Cártel del Golfo (CDG), a Mexican criminal syndicate that was designated as a foreign terrorist organization.

A DEA wanted poster of Juan Carlos Valencia Gonzalez also known as “Pelon”

The new leader of Mexico’s Jalisco New Generation cartel is an American citizen, a distinction that could complicate efforts by U.S. intelligence and law enforcement agencies to target him even as Washington and Mexico deepen cooperation against drug traffickers.

Gun wall rack with pistols at a gun show.

Weapons traffickers supplying Mexico’s Sinaloa Cartel have sharply increased shipments from the United States, with demand fueled by cartel warfare and financed through a growing cross-border smuggling business that now moves hundreds of firearms at a time.

Container ships entering the port of Freetown Sierra Leone seen from the sea

West Africa has become a major and expanding logistics, warehousing, and redistribution hub in the global cocaine trade, with the market in the region larger than ever and increasingly damaging to public health, governance, and security.

A view of a road in Bernalillo County, New Mexico where cars drive while the mountains at dawn loom in the background

FinCEN said Tuesday it has expanded a geographic targeting order (GTO) along the Southwest border, extending the measure into New Mexico for the first time and adding Maricopa and Pima counties in Arizona.