The Racist Shortcut: How CCN Turned Drugs Into an Immigration Story

 

Apparently, Facts Were Not Invited to the Meeting

There is a difference between reporting on a serious problem and using a serious problem as an excuse to recycle racial stereotypes. Cowlitz County News seems to have decided that difference is simply too much work.

The latest example is CCN's attempt to connect the drug problems affecting Longview and the surrounding area to undocumented immigrants while presenting that narrative as though it were some settled matter of fact.

There is just one tiny problem: the facts do not actually cooperate with the story they are trying to sell.

Apparently, facts were not invited to CCN's table when they had this particular conversation.

CCN's Version of How Drugs Get Here

CCN asks, “Do people understand how drugs get into our community?” It then points toward I-5, California, Oregon, and Mexico before declaring that cartels “utilize illegal aliens, and some citizens or Green Card holders, to traffic narcotics into our communities.”

Notice what happens there. The post starts with a legitimate question about drug trafficking and then very quickly turns into an immigration lecture. Apparently, “How do drug-trafficking organizations operate?” was not nearly as satisfying a question as, “How can we work illegal immigrants into this?”

There is absolutely a legitimate discussion to be had about Mexican drug-trafficking organizations, the Sinaloa Cartel, the Jalisco New Generation Cartel, drug-distribution networks, and how narcotics reach Washington.

 

Those cartels are real. Their trafficking operations are real. The drug crisis is real. What is not established by any of those facts is the giant leap from “Mexican cartels traffic drugs” to “therefore, undocumented immigrants are bringing most of the drugs into the country.”

That is not how evidence works. It is, however, apparently how Facebook works.

Then the Actual Numbers Show Up and Ruin Everything

The Government Accountability Office reported in 2026 that most fentanyl and methamphetamine trafficking into the United States occurs through official ports of entry along the southwest border. More than 90 percent of interdicted fentanyl is stopped at those locations, and traffickers primarily use vehicles driven by U.S. citizens.

There it is. The giant immigration villain CCN's narrative wants you to picture wandering through the desert with a backpack full of fentanyl is, according to the actual data, not the primary mechanism by which these drugs enter the country.

Instead, traffickers are using vehicles and established transportation routes through legal ports of entry. In other words, the drug cartels apparently have figured out something CCN's comment section has not: why sneak across the desert when you can drive through a checkpoint?

The Numbers Are Being Really Rude to This Narrative

The U.S. Sentencing Commission's 2025 data make the argument even more awkward. In FY2025, U.S. citizens accounted for 81 percent of people sentenced for federal drug-trafficking offenses. Eighty-one percent. That is not exactly a statistical rounding error.

Cato's analysis of federal conviction data found essentially the same thing. U.S. citizens accounted for 78 percent of federal drug-trafficking convictions nationwide in FY2024. In the Southwest border districts, U.S. citizens accounted for 72 percent. For fentanyl trafficking specifically, U.S. citizens accounted for nearly 79 percent of convictions in Southwest border districts between 2018 and 2024.

So, when somebody says, “Illegal aliens are responsible for the drugs,” there is a really simple question that follows: Based on what?

Not Facebook. Not “I know what I see.” Not “Everybody knows.” Not some guy named Earl who has been watching cable news since breakfast.

Actual evidence.

Where the Drugs Are Actually Being Intercepted

This is where CCN's narrative starts developing structural problems.

The Government Accountability Office found that approximately 63 percent of fentanyl seized by DHS from FY2021 through FY2024 was seized at ports of entry. Almost 70 percent of the fentanyl seized at ports of entry during that period was captured at just three Southwest border land ports.

Cato's analysis of CBP data found that from FY2015 through FY2025, approximately 85 percent of fentanyl was seized at ports of entry, compared with 11 percent seized by Border Patrol on patrol.

Project On Government Oversight examined Border Patrol encounters between ports of entry and found that fentanyl seizures involving migrants were extremely rare. The evidence paints a very different picture from the one CCN is selling.

The overwhelming majority of fentanyl is being intercepted at legal ports of entry. The majority of people sentenced for federal drug trafficking are U.S. citizens. Traffickers frequently use U.S. citizens driving vehicles to move drugs through ports of entry. Migrants encountered between ports of entry are responsible for only a tiny fraction of fentanyl seizures.

Yet somehow the conclusion being served to Cowlitz County is: “ILLEGAL ALIENS!”

Apparently, nuance died somewhere around the time somebody opened Facebook.

Even the Cartels Understand Basic Logistics

One of the screenshots associated with this discussion points out that cartels prefer U.S. citizens. This should not be shocking.

A U.S. citizen can legally enter the United States. A U.S. citizen driving a vehicle through a port of entry does not automatically trigger the same scrutiny as somebody attempting to cross illegally.

This is not complicated. Cartels are not sitting around holding meetings where someone says, “Guys, let's make this as difficult and suspicious as possible.” They are criminal organizations. They want the drugs moved successfully.

Apparently, they understand logistics.

Then We Get to the Comment Section

This is where things become almost impressively stupid.

One commenter declared that illegal aliens have been responsible for drugs in this country for generations and concluded that they all “need to go.”

Notice the complete lack of evidence connecting the first statement to the second. Drug trafficking exists. Therefore, immigrants. That is apparently the entire syllogism.

Another commenter reduced the issue to:

“ILLEGAL Drugs
ILLEGAL Aliens”

Apparently, if two phrases contain the word “illegal,” they must obviously be causally connected. By that logic, illegal dumping, illegal parking, and illegal immigration must all be part of the same international conspiracy.

At least the rocks in a box know not to make that argument.

Another commenter responded to the question of who brings in the drugs with a laughing “lol.” Another insisted that fentanyl killing American kids “mostly comes from Mexico,” followed by the predictable demand for more secure borders.

Nobody is disputing that fentanyl enters the United States from Mexico. That is not the argument. The argument is whether undocumented immigrants crossing the border are the primary people bringing those drugs into the country.

The evidence says no.

Mexico and “illegal immigrant” have apparently become interchangeable concepts in some people's heads. That is a problem.

Then Someone Actually Read the Information

One commenter, Jeremy McShane, pointed out that many drug traffickers are U.S. citizens and explained why using someone who can cross a legal port of entry without attracting the same level of scrutiny makes practical sense. He was promptly met with, “You know this how?”

Well, apparently Jeremy did something absolutely outrageous.

He looked it up.

That's it. No secret cartel meeting, no classified intelligence briefing, and no midnight meeting with the CIA in a Denny's parking lot. He used Google.

Jeremy got that information from the exact same place CCN got the information it decided to put a racist spin on. The difference is that Jeremy apparently read the information instead of stopping at the part that confirmed what he already wanted to believe.

What a radical concept.

What CCN Leaves Out Is the Entire Point

CCN knows how to name the cartels. It knows how to mention the Sinaloa Cartel and CJNG. It knows drugs travel north on highways. It knows I-5 is a major transportation corridor. None of that is controversial.

The problem is taking those facts, tossing “illegal immigrants” into the middle of them, and presenting the resulting stew as journalism.

The existence of a Mexican cartel does not prove undocumented immigrants are the primary smugglers. The existence of a border does not prove people crossing illegally are responsible for most of the drugs. The fact that fentanyl originates in Mexico does not prove undocumented immigrants are bringing it into the United States.

Those are three different claims. Very different claims.

Apparently, CCN decided that was close enough. It isn't.

This Is What Racism Looks Like When It Gets a News Logo

You can support stronger border security. You can support aggressive prosecution of drug traffickers. You can believe Mexican cartels are a serious threat. You can believe fentanyl is devastating American communities. You can believe all of those things while still acknowledging what the evidence actually says.

What you cannot legitimately do is take a complicated drug-trafficking problem, attach it to a racialized caricature of undocumented immigrants, and then slap the word “news” on top.

That is not journalism. That is political messaging wearing a cheap press badge.

The Audience Starts Repeating the Message

When people are repeatedly handed the unsupported message that “illegal aliens = drugs,” eventually the comment section starts repeating it as though Moses himself brought it down from Mount Sinai.

The screenshots show this happening in real time.

Ironically, one commenter made the most sensible observation in the entire discussion: people in Longview should be more worried about the drugs than about undocumented immigrants.

Correct. Finally, somebody wandered into the conversation carrying common sense.

People should be worried about the drugs. That is precisely why they deserve accurate information about how those drugs actually get here, who traffics them, and where law enforcement is actually finding them.

They do not need a convenient scapegoat. They need the truth.

There Is a Real Drug Crisis. That Is Why Making Shit Up Is Particularly Stupid.

The United States has a serious drug-trafficking problem. Mexican transnational criminal organizations are involved. Fentanyl is entering the country through the Southwest border. Drug traffickers use private vehicles, commercial vehicles, human couriers, and established transportation networks.

None of that needs to be exaggerated. None of it needs to be turned into an immigration scare story.

Most fentanyl is intercepted at legal ports of entry. U.S. citizens constitute the overwhelming majority of people sentenced for federal drug trafficking. Mexican cartels use American-based distribution networks and American drivers.

That is the story. It just is not nearly as useful if your goal is to make people angry at immigrants.

The Followers Deserve Some Credit, Though Not Much

Some of the comments under CCN's post are so spectacularly detached from the available evidence that calling them “dumb as a box of rocks” almost feels like insulting the rocks.

At least the rocks have an excuse. They do not have Google.

The problem is not that every person commenting is stupid. There are clearly people in that comment section who understand the distinction between cartel trafficking, immigration, and drug distribution.

The problem is that far too many people appear willing to believe something simply because it confirms what they already wanted to believe.

That is how this works. Give people something they are afraid of. Give them a villain who looks different from them. Repeat the same claim often enough. Eventually, evidence becomes an inconvenience rather than a requirement.

Suddenly, a complicated international drug-trafficking network becomes “illegal aliens.” A federal data set becomes “common sense.” Racism gets a little news-logo makeover.

The Scott Varner exchange is particularly revealing because CCN's response is not to address the substance of the criticism. It is essentially that they do not want to “discourage people” from commenting.

Translation: Please keep the engagement coming, even if the comments are based on nonsense.

Apparently, Facebook engagement is more important than correcting utter nonsense.

News Organizations Have a Responsibility to Get the Facts Right

CCN is free to have opinions. Its commenters are free to have opinions. Nobody is stopping anybody from believing whatever they want.

Nobody is entitled to have their opinions magically upgraded into facts because they typed them underneath a post from a page calling itself a news organization.

If CCN wants to talk about the drug crisis in Cowlitz County, let's talk about it. Let's talk about cartels, trafficking organizations, ports of entry, U.S. citizens being recruited to smuggle drugs, domestic distribution networks, fentanyl demand in the United States, and what actually works.

That would be useful.

The Bottom Line

What we do not need is another lazy attempt to convince people that the person crossing the border illegally is automatically the person carrying the drugs.

The federal data do not support that story. They support a much more complicated one.

Apparently, complicated is not nearly as satisfying when you are trying to sell people a villain.

So here is a radical idea for CCN: try reporting the facts without seasoning them with racism first.

The drug crisis is serious enough without turning immigrants into a convenient punching bag. If the facts make the immigration narrative fall apart, maybe the problem is not the facts.

Maybe it is the narrative.

Calling something “news” does not magically make it news.

Sometimes, it is just prejudice with a headline.