The Subcommittee on Federal Law Enforcement held a roundtable this week addressing policies under the Biden administration that enabled the onslaught of unaccompanied alien children (UACs) into the United States.
During the roundtable, Ali Hopper, President & Co-Founder of GUARD Against Trafficking, revealed that cartels and laundering networks have promoted child trafficking operations. “Our research shows that cartels like Sinaloa and CJNG are maintaining southern infrastructure while expanding northern land and maritime routes and exploiting jurisdictional and resource gaps across tribal lands. Confronting these networks requires federal, state, and local cooperation,” Hopper said. “A recent multi-agency operation in Florida recovered 163 missing children, half of whom I have personally verified were UACs. This shows what coordinated action can accomplish, and at the same. In that same coordination must follow these criminal networks wherever they operate.”
Inquiring as to how cartels reach children, Subcommittee Chairman Clay Higgins (R-LA) asked Hopper, “How does a child go from an innocent kid, underprivileged, challenged, but still an innocent kid to in the grasp of that cartel pipeline and ultimately find themselves indebted to the cartels and unable to escape? Can you just walk us through that process?”
Hopper explained traffickers “exploit the hope” of migrants due to the messaging from the previous White House administration that the “border is open.”
China is also believed to be involved in child trafficking networks. Rep. Scott Perry (R-PA) highlighted that some suspicious activity reports have come from the Chinese Communist Party, which Illicit Finance Strategy Consultant at Chenega Defense & Aerospace Solutions Louis DeTitto explained is fed through aggregator accounts involving “human trafficking, illicit massage businesses, human smuggling, network operations” and marijuana operations in the United States.
The Trump administration has already recovered 148,000 missing migrant children.
“We are taking historic action to protect one of the most vulnerable victims of the Biden Administration’s open border crisis — migrant children,” Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin wrote on X. “We have already located over 148,000 of these children, and we will not stop fighting until every last one is rescued.”
Mullin’s comment came in response to President Trump sharing a migrant children chart on Truth Social, writing, “These are the missing children, and we’re not being helped at all by Sanctuary Cities. They’re going out of their way to make sure the children remain missing!” The chart indicated that as of July, more that 330,000 children remain unaccounted for.
