Over the weekend, authorities at the U.S.-Mexico border discovered and confiscated several thousand pounds of illicit drugs concealed within containers of food.
An inspection site in San Diego found the narcotics inside a commercial tractor-trailer, which are valued at almost $10.4 million. Officials from the border agency discovered the illegal goods inside the vehicle, which was allegedly transporting jalapeño paste.
Along with the paste, however, the cargo included 349 bags of cocaine and meth. Police officers removed the items from the trailer after K-9 dogs were brought in and alerted them that the truck “was hot.”
A K-9 inspection unit notified Customs and Border Protection agents to examine the jalapeño paste more thoroughly after 10:30 a.m. on Wednesday when the suspected illegal substances were first detected.
Federal agents from the Homeland Security Investigations will now question the truck driver. The San Diego Field Office of U.S. Customs and Border Protection confiscated almost fourteen thousand pounds of drugs at land ports of entry in California last month. In the wake of the current surge of migrants into the United States, some Republicans have been raising concerns about border security for months. Many hold the Biden administration responsible for this crisis. Huddled together for weeks, senators have been trying to reach a border security accord before the year ends.
An operation off the coast of Southern California earlier this month reportedly unloaded over 18,219 kg of cocaine, worth an estimated almost $240 million, on the street, according to a Coast Guard report. As was shown this week with the charges against four individuals who were reportedly involved in a global drug trade that sent large quantities of cocaine and methamphetamine to New Zealand, Australia, and Papua New Guinea, it is not uncommon for drug dealers to conceal their wares in peculiar locations.
