LAREDO, Texas — Drugs, guns, and ammo: Those are just some of the items criminals try to smuggle into the United States every day, according to U.S. Customs and Border Protection.
At eight South Texas ports of entry, CBP officials said they’re seeing a spike in smugglers trying to get hard drugs, like cocaine and methamphetamine into the U.S.
Between October of 2021 and September of this year, CBP officers seized 47,755 pounds of drugs with an estimated street value of $436 million.
Officials said the amount of cocaine seized is up 19 percent from last year, as they’re also seeing a spike in other drugs at the ports of entry including including marijuana, methamphetamine, heroin, and fentanyl.
A large amount of drugs is not the only illegal items they’re finding, according to CBP officials.
Across the eight ports of entry, officers also collected almost $6 million in un-reported currency, over 300 weapons, and 78,497 rounds of ammunition.
This all comes as officers are encountering an influx of migrants, the numbers up by almost 200 percent.
“The hard narcotics volume underscores the seriousness of the drug threat we face and hemispheric economic and security challenges also tend to drive the migration volumes,” the Laredo (Acting) Director of Field Operations, Eugene Crawford said in a press release.
Also intercepted: almost 100,000 quarantine animal and plant materials, and over 5,000 pests, according to CBP officials.
Another warning from CBP: if you find a deal on a designer product that’s too good to be true, keep looking, because it could be a fake.
In the last year, CBP reports seizing over $9 million worth of counterfeit items.
>MORE BORDER NEWS: