The Chinese mafia, Venezuelan criminals, drug cartels and Chilean gangs: The United States suffers an invasion by foreign criminal organizations

For three and a half years, Republicans have been systematically denouncing that the United States is being invaded along the southern border. They have no shortage of reasons.

In recent years, a series of foreign criminal gangs have begun to have a presence in the United States, and some even took advantage of a series of lax laws in some states to practically take over the marijuana business, bringing with them an avalanche of violence and crime.

Authorities in recent months have revealed that, for example, Chinese organized crime is running lucrative slave-labor drug farms in a half-dozen U.S. states. This situation unfolds as thousands of Chinese migrants cross the southern border every month, exposing themselves to an entire human trafficking network by foreign gangs who use illegal migration to boost their illicit businesses.

However, the established criminal gangs come not only from China but also from the American continent.

Notably, the main Mexican drug cartels now have a presence in every state in the country. Likewise, authorities detected that Tren de Aragua, a dangerous, fast-growing Venezuelan gang, also has a presence in several important cities in the country, feeding off the border crisis. Although it is not technically illegal migration, dozens of Chilean gangs are taking advantage of a visa agreement between the United States and Chile to settle in the country and carry out a lucrative business of robbing luxury mansions.

Meanwhile, the drug business or robberies are not the only concerns of the authorities, who in the last month detected eight illegal migrants possibly linked to ISIS. This situation generates particular fear due to the growing threat of terrorist attacks in the country as conflicts develop in the Middle East, where Washington has had a presence or influence.

Chinese gangs take over the marijuana market, spilling blood

In March 2024, the ProPublica organization published an extensive report highlighting how the Chinese mafia began to control the illegal marijuana business in the country.

In the report, they highlight a quadruple murder at an illegal marijuana farm in Kingfisher County, Oklahoma, in 2022. That event uncovered a dark reality: “Chinese criminal networks have taken over much of the illicit marijuana market in the U.S., stoking a wave of crime that includes violence, money laundering and human trafficking.”

The report, prepared by ProPublica and The Frontier, details that, from California to Maine, the Chinese mafia dominates much of the illicit marijuana trade in the country, generating explosive growth of this criminal industry that also developed a violent trafficking ecosystem whitewashing, sexual crimes, vice, fraud, assaults and even environmental damage.

Who are the main people affected? Chinese migrants who approach the southern border are captured by these dangerous gangs that require slave labor to operate their farms outside the law.

According to ProPublica, thousands of Chinese immigrants smuggled into the United States are recruited to work in abusive conditions on marijuana farms surrounded by cameras, fences and even armed guards.

“A grim offshoot of this indentured servitude: Traffickers force Chinese immigrant women into prostitution for the bosses of the agricultural workforce,” the report states.

State and federal officials detail that Chinese criminals operate under a disciplined confederation overseen from New York by mafias rooted in southern China. What impresses many, including federal investigators, is how they took over the illegal marijuana business in a matter of years.

In 2018, Chinese mafias set their sights on Oklahoma when voters legalized the cultivation and sale of medical marijuana. The relatively lax law did not limit dispensaries or cultivation and required owners to be state residents. However, weak enforcement of the law allowed outside investors to use frontmen and illegally traffic marijuana, according to ProPublica.

This business model led to a rapid expansion of an illicit industry that used the lax laws of some states to establish a criminal scheme that produces blood, death and drug trafficking. The industry has grown so much that it is now the second largest in the country after oil and gas.

The black market explains this large flow of money from illegal trafficking. Since Colorado legalized marijuana in 2012, even though state laws have varied, federal law has always been clear and prohibited interstate sales. This disparity in laws, legal loopholes or high taxes in certain legislation had consequences: greater ease for the cultivation and development of an illegal, massive and lucrative market.

To gauge how big this business is, Oklahoma alone has quickly become one of the top suppliers of illegal marijuana.

“Although street prices fluctuate and calculating the value of a black market is complex, officials estimate the value of the illegal marijuana grown in the state at somewhere between $18 billion and $44 billion a year,” ProPublica reported. “State investigators have found links between foreign mafias and over 3,000 illegal grows — and they say that more than 80% of the criminal groups are of Chinese origin.”

Despite this, the response from the authorities has been weak. With legalization and decriminalization, law enforcement for the Department of Justice decreased among its priorities. This directly allowed the Chinese mafias to expand their influence and even begin to launder money for cartels.

"The challenge we are having is a lack of interest by federal prosecutors to charge illicit marijuana cases," Ray Donovan, former DEA chief of operations, told ProPublica. “They don’t realize all the implications. Marijuana causes so much crime at the local level, gun violence in particular. The same groups selling thousands of pounds of marijuana are also laundering millions of dollars of fentanyl money. It’s not just one-dimensional.”

And Oklahoma is “just” the tip of a giant Iceberg.

Recently, CBS News reported that hundreds of properties in Maine have been investigated as marijuana farms run by Chinese criminal gangs.

The report noted that in December, after a month and a half investigation, Maine authorities raided a home in Machias, a rural town on the southeast coast, and found a facility with more than 2,600 plants and 100 pounds of marijuana processed and packaged.

"I've been doing this a lot of years, and that was probably the biggest indoor marijuana grow I've ever seen," Police Chief Keith Mercier told the news network. "It was quite an impressive operation."

These operations have also emerged in California, New Mexico and Washington state.

The Daily Mail tabloid relates these operations to human trafficking and the migration crisis, recalling that at least 37,000 Chinese migrants entered the United States through Texas in 2023 alone, a figure that is 10 times greater than the last 10 years combined.

The Daily Mail describes in its report that these migrants suffer the consequences of a monstrous model. For example, Lynn Sanchez, director of the organization The Life Link, said that Chinese immigrants on a farm in New Mexico were found with “visible burns on their hands and arms.”

"They were very scared, very freaked out," Sanchez said. "They looked very malnourished."

Was Aragua Train installed in the United States?

With a presence in ten countries in the Western Hemisphere, the dangerous Venezuelan gang Tren de Aragua has become one of the fastest-growing criminal organizations in the world.

Now, according to authorities, it is almost certain that the gang has a presence and operates in the United States through the illegal crossing of the southern border by its members, who enter the country requesting asylum.

Recently, NBC News revealed that, currently, authorities have already linked the Venezuelan criminal organization with more than 100 investigations being carried out on criminal cases.

The information emerged after Customs and Border Protection included Tren de Aragua in its list of gangs for the fiscal year 2024. The list is published on the official CBP website.

According to various reports, this gang could be recruiting Venezuelan migrants for its criminal operations. For example, the New York Post tabloid reported that Tren de Aragua is extending its tentacles to the streets of the Big Apple to carry out its illicit operations in the United States.

Specifically, members of Tren de Aragua are behind a mega cell phone theft operation in New York City.

According to the New York Police Department (NYPD), between April 2023 and January 2024, there were 160 motorcycle theft patterns, a substantial increase compared to 62 between April 2022 and January 2023. Up to 20 crimes can be included in a pattern.

Deputy Inspector Nicholas Fiore of the NYPD's Crimes Against Persons Unit told FOX 5 N.Y. that Tren de Aragua gang members operate similarly to members of the better-known Salvadoran gang MS-13.

Mainly, the modus operandi of Tren de Aragua in NYC would work like this: first, its gang members steal cell phones. Then, they empty the bank accounts of those attacked through hacking. Subsequently, fraudulent transactions are carried out in both the United States and South America. And, as a last step, the stolen phones are sent to Colombia or Venezuela to be erased, reprogrammed and sold.

According to Fiore, the members of Tren de Aragua entered the United States from the southern border last December. Their main task to achieve rapid expansion was to recruit migrants via WhatsApp, a distinctive characteristic of this gang, according to two security experts consulted by Voz Media for a more extensive report on the dangerous Venezuelan gang.

The problem is that even though the U.S. authorities consider that Tren de Aragua operates in the United States, Venezuelan security experts affirm that it is very difficult to determine whether the gang was officially established in the country because there is no collaboration between Venezuelan and American authorities.

An international alert confirmed one of the few official members of Tren de Aragua detained in the United States. The criminal, who had crossed the southern border, was wanted in Peru for illicit association, assault and aggravated robbery.

Likewise, ICE confirmed to Voz Media that two members of Tren de Aragua were detained in New York City: Wilson Juárez, 21 years old, and Kelvin Servita Arocha, 19. Both participated in the viral beating of police officers on January 27.

"Yes, the two non-citizens who were in ICE custody and charged in conjunction with the violent gang assault carried out against two NYPD officers were identified as members of the transnational criminal organization Tren de Aragua (TdA)," an ICE spokeswoman told Voz Media.

According to Joseph Humire, executive director of the Center for a Free and Secure Society and global security expert specializing in analyzing transregional threat networks, the presence of Tren de Aragua in the United States is increasing and authorities should be on alert.

“Tren de Aragua is the transnational organized crime group that is growing most rapidly in the world. About six years ago they had a presence in two countries, in South America, and currently they have a presence in ten countries throughout the Western Hemisphere, including the United States," Humire told Voz Media before explaining that the gang caused destabilization in countries like Peru, Colombia or Chile and that is why the United States must take the threat very seriously.

“The United States already has many security problems in large cities like New York, Chicago, and Los Angeles. And if Tren de Aragua begins, as it seems to be already doing, to penetrate these communities of Venezuelan migrants, the destabilization could be greater.”

Robberies of luxurious mansions, the specialty of Chilean gangs

Up to one hundred small gangs of Chilean origin, made up of between three and six people, were detected in the United States committing a crime that seriously worries the authorities: criminal tourism.

A report from the Oakland police in Michigan showed that these gangs from the trans-Andean country operated in California, Arizona, Florida, Virginia, New York, Ohio, Indiana and Michigan. Their objective is straightforward: rob mansions or luxury homes from wealthy neighborhoods.

Sheriff Michael Bouchard stated that all of the people they arrested had violated the U.S.-Chile Visa Waiver Program, which is a program that allows people from certain countries to come to a U.S. territory for 90 days for tourism or business without obtaining a visa.

The situation worries Oakland authorities so much that Sheriff Bouchard asked the federal government to cancel the exemption.

The sheriff explained to potential victims that the gangs are very effective and operate as special agents after an exhaustive investigation of their targets. All the houses were looted when the owners were on vacation.

Bouchard warned that thieves can jam wireless signals from cameras, alarms and phones. Likewise, he revealed that they steal heavy safes. Therefore, he recommended that they use wiring systems to improve security because thieves demonstrated a remarkable ability to turn off WIFI signals with blockers.

Authorities revealed that, as of the end of 2023, more than 40 homes have been burglarized in Oakland County, Michigan alone. In some cases, thieves were able to loot up to a million dollars.

ISIS terrorists in the United States?

In June, up to eight migrants from Tajikistan arrived in the United States across the southern border. However, even though their criminal background checks came back clean at the time they crossed, all of them could have ties to ISIS, according to authorities.

According to NBC News, the migrants were detained in New York, Philadelphia and Los Angeles after they came on the FBI's Joint Terrorism Task Force's radar.

All were arrested by ICE personnel.

“The FBI’s Joint Terrorism Task Force has been aware of a potential terrorist threat originating in central Europe, and it began monitoring these men as part of that investigation,” NBC reported, citing three unnamed official sources.

Now, the eight migrants face deportation proceedings before an immigration judge and could face terrorism-related charges.

The arrival of these eight migrants potentially linked to ISIS occurs just as authorities warn that the United States is exposed to terrorist threats, including potential attacks.

Just earlier this month, FBI Director Chris Wray warned of the possibility of a "potential for a coordinated attack here in the homeland, not unlike the ISIS-K attack we saw at the Russian concert hall."

Mexican cartels have a presence throughout the country

While the immigration crisis continues to hit the southern border, overwhelming Customs and Border Protection (CBP) officials, the main Mexican cartels - the Sinaloa Cartel and the Jalisco New Generation Cartel- are increasing their expansion into U.S. territory.

According to the annual report on illegal drug trafficking prepared by the United States Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA), these cartels operate in all 50 states, concentrating their criminal activity in Texas, Arizona, California and Florida.

These cartels, according to the report, “have caused the worst drug crisis in U.S. history.”

“They dictate the flow of nearly all illicit drugs into the United States, and their dominance over the synthetic drug trade in particular is evident in the relentless stream of illicit fentanyl and methamphetamine crossing the border toward U.S. markets. The ease and low cost of producing these drugs on a large scale in Mexico makes them highly profitable,” details the DEA, ensuring that the crystal methamphetamine sold by the cartels is more powerful and cheaper than at any other time in the last decade.

“In addition, the cartels deliberately market illicit fentanyl in pill form to mimic trademarked prescription medications; as a result, many Americans are buying and consuming illegal drugs they believe to be legitimate prescription drugs,” the DEA says.

Of course, as with the Chinese mafia, the cartels feed on the border crisis to develop their criminal business. The result is that migrants are at the mercy of these dangerous and powerful criminal groups that have practically taken over the southern border.