Free Republic

Kilmar Abrego Garcia, a suspected MS-13 gang member whose deportation case has made him a hero for the Democratic Party, was previously stopped by a highway patrol officer while driving a car belonging to a confessed human trafficker, multiple Department of Homeland Security sources revealed in a bombshell report from Just The News. Abrego Garcia — a Salvadoran illegal alien who has been falsely referred to as a “Maryland man” by Democrat politicians and mainstream media outlets — was pulled over driving an SUV belonging to Jose Ramon Hernandez Reyes in Tennessee. Reyes, another illegal alien, confessed to participating in...

Smugglers living along key migration routes thrived off the U.S. border crisis, but are now left with next to no income after illegal migrants have largely given up trying to reach the southern border under the Trump administration’s watch. Residents living in the Darien Gap — a vast jungle region between Colombia and Panama that serves as a pivotal way station for northbound migrants — took advantage of the endless number of illegal immigrants who trekked across their lands during the Biden-era, according to locals who spoke with the Associated Press. Noticing an opportunity from those that needed to be...

Federal authorities have charged four defendants with operating one of the largest human smuggling rings in the United States. The indictment alleges that the transnational criminal organization smuggled around 20,000 undocumented immigrants from Guatemala to the U.S. via Mexico. The group is accused of holding individuals hostage, threatening violence, and being responsible for a fatal car crash in Oklahoma in 2023, which resulted in seven deaths, including three minors. The ringleader, Eduardo Domingo Renoj-Matul, and his associate, Marsha Char, have been arrested and pleaded not guilty. A trial date is being set. Another defendant, Helmer Obispo-Hernandez, remains a fugitive and...

Archbishop Viganò: US bishops attack Trump after losing government cashIf the USCCB truly is not concerned about getting government funds and cares only about charitable works, it will have no objection if the President orders a forsensic audit to find out how the funding it has received has been spent.The following was originally written and published February 19 by Archbishop Carlo Maria Viganò on X after news broke that the USCCB was suing the Trump administration. (LifeSiteNews) — For years, the USCCB, had always been most careful to keep the utmost silence in regard to Democrat administrations, even when matters...

EXCLUSIVE: Can J.D. Vance Help Save the Catholic Church?One Catholic vice president has all but destroyed the Church, now it’s time for another Catholic vice president to save it.A little over 10 years ago, Vice President Joe Biden became the point man to solve the crisis of thousands upon thousands of parentless children illegally entering America along its Southern Border. Over the spring and summer of 2014, over 60,000 unaccompanied minors—some as young as four—came across the Mexican border. Most of them were boys, 13 to 17. There were girls too. It was the cartels who brought them. The crimes...

"Wen obtained firearms, ammunition, and export-controlled technology with the intention of shipping them to North Korea — a violation of federal law and United States sanctions against that nation," the agency says An illegal immigrant from China was arrested for allegedly shipping "firearms, ammunition and other military items" to North Korea from California, according to a Justice Department indictment released on Tuesday. Shenghua Wen, 41, of Ontario, California, was arrested on Tuesday after hiding the weapons "inside shipping containers bound from Long Beach," the agency said. Wen, who was a Chinese national illegally residing in the United States, was expected...

In the lead up to the Israel Defense Forces’ (IDF) operation to destroy Hamas and secure the release of over 100 hostages – including 8 Americas – believed to be in and around Rafah, leaders around the world from Joe Biden to the collective leftist leaders of the European Union to Egyptian President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi panicked and ordered Israel to forestall its necessary means to end the war.Why did world leaders clamor for Israel to do nothing?What are they hiding?It turns out they are hiding a lot.Over one million Gazans were said to be sheltering in humanitarian safe areas...

I am sitting in a shopping mall in Iraq, face-to-face with one of Europe’s most notorious people-smugglers. His name is Barzan Majeed, and he is wanted by police forces in several countries, including the UK. Over the course of our conversation - both here and the next day at his office - he says he does not know how many migrants he has transported across the English Channel. “Maybe a thousand, maybe 10,000. I don’t know, I didn’t count.” The meeting is the culmination of what had seemed like an impossible task a few months earlier. Together with Rob Lawrie,...

In a brazen demonstration of who controls the border, Mexican smugglers set up a make-shift ramp to drive a car over the southern border of the US in Arizona 'That's the international boundary on the Tohono O'odham reservation,' posted union vice president Art Del Cueto. 'Those extra things you see are ramps that the smugglers utilize to drive a car over the boundary and into the United States. The Native American nation is on record opposing the 30-foot high, steel wall that US officials say is a crucial layer in helping to stem the flow of migrants. In some places...

Police tracking drugs in our area are sounding the alarm with cocaine and meth making a comeback. Metro Detroit law enforcement is warning of an uptick in meth and cocaine use across the area. "The danger of this is significant to everybody," said Oakland County Sheriff Michael Bouchard. "Basically the cost of cocaine, the cost of meth, all of that has gone down to about a third of what it was two years ago." Bouchard says it is a supply and demand issue, combined with the already troubling amounts of fentanyl coming into the states. He says it is a...

FBI Director Christopher Wray 'very concerned' about smuggling network tied to ISIS .. FBI Director Christopher Wray on Monday warned of a "wide array" of dangerous threats coming from the U.S. border, including drug trafficking, violent gangs and smugglers with ties to ISIS. Wray was asked by Sen. Marco Rubio, R-Fla., at a Senate Intelligence Committee hearing about the threats at the border, including the Tren de Aragua gang from Venezuela. Wray said he couldn’t speak to a specific gang, but said that there were dangerous individuals entering via the southern border. "From an FBI perspective, we are seeing a...

Texas sues to shut down ‘Catholic’ organization accused of facilitating illegal immigration'The chaos at the southern border has created an environment where NGOs, funded with taxpayer money from the Biden Administration, facilitate astonishing horrors including human smuggling,' state Attorney General Ken Paxton said.AUSTIN, Texas (LifeSiteNews) — Texas Republican Attorney General Ken Paxton announced Tuesday that he is suing to force the closure of a “Catholic” non-governmental organization (NGO) it contends is helping facilitate illegal immigration.In a press release, Paxton said he is seeking to end Annunciation House’s Texas operations based on a review of “significant public record information strongly suggesting”...

Wildlife trafficking is an ongoing problem in Spain and throughout Europe. In a recent crackdown, authorities in Guadalajara have made a significant arrest and seized 170 kilos of live elvers. On a routine inspection, Guardia Civil officers apprehended an individual on Tuesday, December 12, near Cifuentes, Guadalajara. During a Citizen Security patrol, officers identified a rental van which was parked at a service station. Upon questioning the driver of the vehicle appeared nervous. The officer’s suspicions were well-founded as the van, which seemingly carried clothing, hid a more sinister cargo. Elver Smuggling Exposed In what appeared to be an ordinary...

Human smugglers have been taking advantage of record heat at the southern border to sneak migrants into the US, believing that there will be fewer border officers to stop them, according to officials. A record number of dead migrants have been recovered at the border as temperatures soared above 100 degrees for 36 consecutive days, the US Border Patrol said. “We are currently recording a significant number of migrant deaths in New Mexico due to the desert terrain and extreme heat,” the agency told the Border Report. In the summer, smugglers at the border normally avoid the hottest hours of...

(The Hill) – A Texas kayaking company has sued Gov. Greg Abbott (R) over his plan to install floating barriers in the middle of the Rio Grande River that would prevent people from being able to swim across it. Jessie Fuentes, owner of Epi’s Canoe & Kayak Team, filed a suit in Austin, Texas on Friday to stop the state from placing the buoys which he claimed would prevent him from giving tours on the river and cause his company “imminent and irreparable harm.” The buoy construction near Eagle Pass, Texas, has already forced Fuentes to cancel a number of...

The Islamic Republic’s Revolutionary Guards (IRGC) have made a criminal Iran’s leading drug lord, Iran International can reveal. Information obtained by Iran International shows how Naji Sharifi-Zindashti and his cartel now dominate the narcotics trade thanks to the support of the government militia. His extraordinary rise comes despite his having killed a prison guard in Iran and fleeing abroad, only to return with impunity. Investigative reporter Mojtaba Pourmohsen has uncovered how a recent rise in the number of executions of convicts sentenced to death on drug-related charges is the result of infighting between rival drug cartels with connections within the...

Rampant smuggling of Australian rock lobsters into mainland China is a national security threat, Hong Kong's new customs chief said on Thursday (Oct 21), as she vowed to crack down on the trade. Lobsters are one of a number of products from Australia that China has restricted imports of as relations between the countries plunged. But they remain a prized and much sought-after delicacy in mainland China. Imports of Australian rock lobsters to Hong Kong - which maintains no restrictions on the crustaceans - have since skyrocketed, with suspicions that the vast majority end up on mainland tables. Louise Ho...

SANTIAGO, Chile -- Chilean police said Monday they have detained an international group of migrant traffickers who have sent more than 1,000 migrants out of the South American nation, including lone children heading to the United States.... ...Police said the ring was led by a Haitian man and also included people from Peru, Paraguay, Venezuela and Chile. The head of the metropolitan police brigade on human trafficking, Giordano Lanzarini, said officials last year detected that children less than 5 years old — offspring of Haitians who are Chilean citizens because born here — were being detected by immigration officials in...

A 6-month-old girl dumped in the Rio Grande River earlier this month was rescued at the U.S.-Mexico border in Texas, officials say. The rescue happened March 16 in Roma, a south Texas town about 105 miles from Monterrey, Mexico. The Texas Department of Public Safety said the infant’s mother suffered a broken leg when she was assaulted by smugglers in Mexico. Smugglers then threw the girl out of a raft and into the river, the department said. The woman paid smugglers $3,500 to cross the border, said Department of Public Safety Lt. Christopher Olivarez, KVEO reported. She and her baby...

Rio Grande Valley Sector Border Patrol agents are utilizing small Unmanned Aircraft Systems (sUAS) to assist with border apprehensions... Over the weekend, agents arrested 67 illegal aliens in six separate sUAS deployments... Since the program’s inception, sUAS teams have been credited with assisting agents in more than 1500 apprehensions in the Rio Grande Valley Sector. The sUAS ability to be deployed quickly and quietly gives agents the upper hand in combating human and drug smuggling attempts. The public is encouraged to take a stand against crime in their communities and report suspicious activity at 800-863-9382