This week, I had the opportunity to ride along with the Kinney County Sheriff’s Department. Kinney County, Texas is a hotspot for human smuggling, facilitated by the cartels. High-speed chases, rollovers, and witnessing graphic deaths are a regular occurrence for deputies in Kinney County. While riding with Deputy Molinar, a veteran deputy from Kinney County, he informed me how cartels are advertising smuggling jobs to Americans.
He showed me one example of an ad on TikTok, and within minutes of looking for myself, I found more than a dozen ads that were blatantly advertising smuggling jobs for the cartel. As I was engaging with these ads, I realized one had an information label from TikTok that read: “Participating in this activity could result in you or others getting hurt.”
TikTok allows human traffickers to post help wanted ads to recruit smugglers.
Footage: @taylerusa for @TPostMillennial pic.twitter.com/y7sUGW6inv
— The Post Millennial (@TPostMillennial) July 5, 2023
Translation: “I need drivers based in Texas. Only serious enquires. Good pay: $10-20K USD in 3 hours. Houston, TX, Dallas, TX, San Marcos, TX, San Marcos, San Antonio, Austin, TX, Waco, TX, Temple, TX. Follow me and DM me if interested and if you have car or truck. We will pay more if you have a trailer.”
As you’ll see, the video with this label is a very obvious example of human smuggling and even shows the process of smuggling migrants past border patrol, chats between the smuggler and the organizer, and then the reward that comes after.
WhatsApp chat translation:
Organizer: “Let me know. When do y’all arrive?”
Smuggler: “40”
Organizer: “Is there traffic?”
Smuggler: “A little bit. No more. 23 min”
This individual account, amongst countless others, are allowed to post recruitment videos with the intent to employ American citizens to engage in human smuggling on behalf of cartels. Instead of removing these illegal advertisements, TikTok allows cartel recruiters to stay on the platform and organize human smuggling operations.
TikTok is well known for being the platform with some of the strictest censorship, but despite that, they seem to be more concerned about Americans voicing their political opinions than organized cartels recruiting Americans to commit multiple felonies via human smuggling.
As this article is published, the account that I’ve used as an example is still active and recruiting American citizens to smuggle illegal immigrants. Sheriff Brad Coe of Kinney County states that “99.9% of smugglers they encounter and arrest are American citizens.”
“We’re seeing all walks of life. We’ve had those that are hurting for money, they’re in a bind financially and are looking to make an easy buck. We’ve picked up a couple attorneys that have been smuggling.
“Recently, we caught two girls from active duty, or at this point in time, I think they were National Guard or active duty smuggling. So, we’ve seen it all. I ran a check on one kid; he was out of the DFW area. Checked to see where he lived, did a little background looking. And of course, he’s living at home, his folks are living in like a $600,000 house. So I don’t think he was here for the money; I think he was here for the thrill. And then there are those who want to make a name for themselves or try to join a gang or do whatever to get into part on that clique to make the easy money. It’s just not worth it.”
Sheriff Brad Coe of Kinney County tells @taylerusa "We've always seen more human smuggling than drugs" at the US Mexico border. pic.twitter.com/jXKdy2qAn0
— The Post Millennial (@TPostMillennial) July 5, 2023
Additional human smuggling ad examples:
Human traffickers promise American drivers can make $10,000 by picking up illegal immigrants and driving them to their next stop. pic.twitter.com/GcX0JF6FHV
— The Post Millennial (@TPostMillennial) July 5, 2023
Another want ad shows a bunch of people packed into a car with bags of money emojis. pic.twitter.com/WFUFAvB91y
— The Post Millennial (@TPostMillennial) July 5, 2023
The cartels target Uber drivers, who are already out driving around, promising big money to bring illegal immigrants deeper into the country after they've crossed the border. pic.twitter.com/K54qmPsUPK
— The Post Millennial (@TPostMillennial) July 5, 2023
It’s a long story….click on the link to read it all
