Smuggling Migrants to the U.S. Is Big Business

The business of smuggling migrants to the U.S.—such as the 53 who died after being left in a truck in San Antonio—has grown quickly with more illegal immigration and stronger links between smugglers and organized crime, according to U.S. and Mexican officials.

Migrants from Guatemala, Honduras and El Salvador pay an estimated $1.7 billion a year to smugglers known as coyotes, according to a 2021 United Nations study. By far the biggest users of coyotes are Guatemalans.

“Migrant smuggling has become an industrial business. Demand is huge and rising, and that means you need more and bigger transportation,” said former Mexican intelligence chief Guillermo Valdés, referring to the practice of packing migrants onto trailer trucks.

The smuggling networks have grown from a cottage industry in rural communities of Mexico and Central America into a big business coveted by criminal organizations such as the Sinaloa and Jalisco cartels, which are the leading suppliers of fentanyl to the U.S.