Grand Canyon Times

The number of border crossings in the Southwest in 2022 has surpassed any year on record by U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP), and voters are about to go to the polls with concerns about the fentanyl crisis on their minds.

According to CBP data, more than 1.8 million border encounters have been reported this year by the Southwest Border Patrol, and monthly encounters have increased each month since the summer. 

"In total, there were 227,547 encounters along the southwest land border in September, a 12% increase compared to August. Of those, 19% involved individuals who had at least one prior encounter in the previous 12 months," a CBP operational report said.

Sen. Mark Kelly (D-AZ) has acknowledged the difficulty of the situation along Arizona’s southern border, but according to a story by KPNX, he voted against an amendment to the Inflation Reduction Act that would have required the government to employ 18,000 Border Patrol agents before hiring any new IRS agents. Funding has been passed to hire 87,000 IRS agents, reports say.

Kelly's opponent,  Republican Blake Masters, has said that, if elected, he would be willing to "shut the government down" over the border crisis to force federal action. With a record number of immigrants crossing into the state, Gov. Doug Ducey has resorted to using shipping containers as makeshift barriers to stem the tide. Masters said of President Joe Biden, “I think he will capitulate” to local pressure if more efforts are made to secure the border.

According to data released by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), more than 2,700 overdose deaths were reported from March 2021-22. Declassified Drug Enforcement Agency intelligence reports show that the New Generation Jalisco and the Sinaloa cartels are the primary traffickers of fentanyl into the U.S., and the cartels have dominated the trafficking corridors at the southern border.

Marc Thiessen, a columnist for The Washington Post, blames the border crisis on Biden’s policies. 

“As the migrant crisis has grown over the past year, fentanyl seizures rose 56% in March 2022 compared with March 2021. And this surge in illegal drugs has contributed to the crime surge in U.S. cities,” he wrote in an opinion piece on April 20.

According to a report by Fox News, 12,000 rainbow fentanyl pills were seized at Los Angeles International Airport, causing officials to worry about the potential for the pills to show up, disguised as candy, in kids’ Halloween trick-or-treat bags.