Montana Attorney General Tim Fox issued the following statement after President Trump addressed the growing U.S.-Mexico border crisis today.

“As Montana’s chief law enforcement officer, every day I see the impact of drugs flowing into the country from our southern border. Our friends, neighbors, and fellow Montanans are suffering and dying. I stand with President Trump in calling upon Congress to secure our border and upon Mexico to work with us in stopping the flow of narcotics into the U.S.”

• Most meth in Montana comes from Mexico. It is made in “superlabs” that can produce large quantities in high purity.
• Since 1980, drug offense rates in Montana have increased 559 percent.
• Meth violations are up over 500-percent in the past 5 years.
• Heroin violations increased more than fifteen hundred percent from 2010 to 2015.
• So far this decade, the total charges in Montana for emergency room and hospital visits with a primary or secondary diagnosis of substance abuse have totaled more than 800 million dollars.
• Montana has experienced a ten-fold increase in the number of infants born with Neonatal Abstinence Syndrome.
• More than 60% of all placements in Montana’s foster care system have a parental substance use indicated. In recent years, meth-indicated placements have grown rapidly, making up more than 45% of all placements.

Resources:

• Assorted imagery related to narcotic trafficking and smuggling (pdf)
• Substance Use in Montana
• Montana DOJ Forensic Science Division 2017 Annual Report

Drug trafficking corridors in the western U.S. (source: National Drug Intelligence Center)