An Examination of U.S. Federal Efforts to Confront Illicit Maritime Activities in U.S. Waters.
Economic Security, Infrastructure Protection, and Cybersecurity
2025-06-10
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Source: Congress.gov
Summary
This bipartisan hearing examines how transnational criminal organizations, including Mexican cartels, are using maritime routes to smuggle drugs, weapons, and people into the United States, bypassing increased land border enforcement. Witnesses from the U.S. Coast Guard, Customs and Border Protection, and Homeland Security Investigations detail current interdiction efforts, including record seizures of cocaine and fentanyl precursor chemicals, and highlight challenges such as aging fleets, insufficient personnel, and resource reallocation to deportation operations. The hearing also addresses concerns over the misuse of Coast Guard assets, the impact of executive orders on federal law enforcement, and the need for expanded maritime authority, such as extending customs waters to 24 nautical miles. Witnesses emphasize that successful maritime border security requires enhanced detection technology, interagency coordination, and policy reforms to ensure federal agencies can fulfill their missions without compromising public safety or constitutional rights.
Participants
Transcript
The Committee on Homeland Security, Subcommittee on Transportation and Maritime Security, and Subcommittee on Border Security and Enforcement will come to order. Without objection, the Chair may declare the committee in recess at any point. The purpose of this hearing is to examine the evolving tactics, geographic patterns, and operational strategies employed by transnational criminal organizations, including Mexican cartels, to exploit U.S. maritime borders for drug smuggling, human trafficking, weapons trafficking, and other illegal activities. We will also evaluate the Department of Homeland Security's interagency efforts, operational posture, and resource allocations for maritime interdiction, with particular emphasis on the U.S. Coast Guard, U.S. Customs and Border Protection, air and maritime operations, and Homeland Security investigations. I would like to thank our colleagues from the Border Security Enforcement Subcommittee for partnering with us on this joint hearing, and I recognize myself for an opening statement. Good morning. I want to thank everyone for being here today. I especially want to thank Chairman Guest and Subcommittee on Border Security and Enforcement for working with us to hold this joint hearing on a matter of growing importance and security for the American homeland. Transnational criminal organizations or TCOs remain agile and persistent adversaries. For years, these groups have exploited vulnerabilities at our southern border, our southern land border, where drug smuggling, human trafficking, and illegal immigration surged to historic levels under the Biden administration. Since the beginning of 2025, however, public data suggests a notable decline in many of these illegal flows. That progress is due in large part to the renewed focus and decisive actions being taken under the current Trump administration to restore control and enforce our laws. But as we improve security on land, we must not allow our maritime domain to become the next weak point. Increasingly, criminal networks are turning to the sea, where vast distances, patchwork jurisdictions, and limited real-time visibility offer TCOs a lower risk of detection and a high reward for moving contraband.
Low maritime routes account for a smaller share of illegal migration and narcotics trafficking compared to land routes. The threat remains serious. TCOs and other criminal actors are leveraging everything from go fast boats, fishing vessels, and narco submarines to container ships and commercial cargo fleets to move cocaine, synthetic drugs, weapons, and human cargo into the United States. The first half of this fiscal year alone, the U.S. Coast Guard has already seized and offloaded more cocaine than it did in all of fiscal year 2024, a clear indicator that illicit maritime activity remains a persistent challenge despite improved enforcement efforts. The scale and sophistication of these operations require an equally coordinated and capable response. As a representative of the Florida Keys and much of South Florida, I know firsthand how vulnerable our maritime borders can be. From the Caribbean to the Straits of Florida and up to the Atlantic Coast, our region has long been a strategic target for smugglers and cartels seeking to enter the U.S. undetected. The threat to our ports, shipping routes, and coastal areas is not theoretical. It directly affects the day-to-day security and economic viability and stability of South Florida. Moreover, while most fentanyl still enters the U.S. through land ports of entry, we cannot ignore the possibility that maritime routes are being used to transport precursor chemicals or synthetic opioids manufactured abroad. This is particularly concerning given the well-documented role that entities based in the People's Republic of China continue to play in supplying the chemical building blocks used to manufacture fentanyl in Mexico. These synthetic opioids are then trafficked into American communities, often with devastating results. Tens of thousands of Americans are dying each year from fentanyl. Beijing is complicit in incentivizing the distribution of these chemicals worldwide, which is responsible for the crisis that now claims the lives of tens of thousands of Americans each year.
It is unknown what role, if any, the Mexican government has had in this crisis as they have failed to stop the flow of these deadly chemicals into the United States. To its credit, the Trump administration has made maritime security a greater priority by investing in interdiction efforts, revitalizing partnerships with key regional allies, and applying needed pressure on adversarial regimes that threaten the safety of the Western Hemisphere. These steps mark a welcome shift in our posture, but as this hearing will show, we must do more. We need a comprehensive maritime security strategy that includes enhanced detection capabilities, more robust interagency coordination, and expanded use of advanced technology to monitor, interdict, and deter illicit maritime activity. Today's hearing is an opportunity to access how federal agencies are responding to these evolving maritime threats. We will hear from those on the front lines about what is working, where the challenges remain, and what resources or authorities may be needed to close remaining gaps. Thank you again to our witnesses for being here today. I look forward to your insights and a productive discussion on how we can better protect our coasts, our communities, and our country from illicit activity at sea. And I recognize the ranking member, the gentlewoman from New Jersey, Ms. McIver, for her opening statements.
Thank you so much, Chairman. Thank you to our witnesses for being here today. Good morning to everyone. Today's hearing provides an opportunity to discuss how Trump's reckless orders are undermining homeland security and making our communities less safe. Over the weekend, we saw Trump federalize the National Guard to respond to protests in Los Angeles and threatened to deploy Marines on U.S. soil against Americans. Trump is using every possible excuse to escalate the situation and manufacture unnecessary confrontations. In January, Trump and Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem ordered the Coast Guards to triple its presence at U.S. borders in an attempt to carry out their reckless immigration policy. This redirection of troops to the border comes at great cost to the Coast Guard's other critical missions. At a time when levels of marine time migration are already down due to this administration's essential ending asylum in the United States, the Coast Guard is pulling assets and personnel from around the globe to sit at the U.S. border. Critically, the Coast Guard has redirected deployments from Indo-Pacific and Arctic regions from Congress has invested heavily on a bipartisan basis in the Coast Guard's capacity to counter aggression from China and Russia. Reducing our activities in the Indo-Pacific and the Arctic undermines our long-term strategic interests and ultimately makes us less safe.
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