Biden-era Coast Guard failed to ‘consistently' stop drug smugglers: watchdog
The U.S. Coast Guard was unable to "consistently" stop drug smugglers during the Biden administration, with vessels unavailable for a combined total of 2,000 days over a three-year period, according to a new report.
The Department of Homeland Security Inspector General report found that the Coast Guard "was not able to consistently interdict non-commercial vessels smuggling drugs into the U.S." from fiscal years 2021 through 2023.
The audit looked at the Coast Guard's ability to stop drug trafficking across 95,000 miles of coastal waters and more than 300 ports. The agency focuses primarily on cocaine because it is the primary drug smuggled across water.
The report found the Coast Guard did not have enough cutter vessels to conduct the antidrug mission and "did not have a contingency plan to address the cutters' unavailability."
"We found Coast Guard cutters were unavailable for 2,058 cumulative days over a 3-year period," the report said.
Reasons for 39 of 90 cutters being unavailable included reallocation to migrant interdiction, unscheduled maintenance or being inoperable due to COVID-19 protocols. The report did find that the number of days the cutters were unavailable increased each year and correlated with a decline in seized cocaine.
"According to Coast Guard personnel, many of the cutters scheduled for the counterdrug mission were reassigned to the migrant crisis, thus reducing the number of cutters available in the maritime transit zone, and negatively impacting cocaine removals," the report said.
"Coast Guard personnel also attributed these issues to deferred maintenance. Coast Guard personnel said that insufficient funding for maintenance and repairs has reduced cutter availability, and that the more maintenance periods that are deferred in the short term, the more downtime is needed for maintenance and repair in the long term," it said.
It said that between fiscal 2021 and fiscal 2023, which included a few months of the Trump administration but was predominantly during the Biden administration, the Coast Guard intercepted around 421 metric tons of cocaine, short of its goal of 690 metric tons.
It also found that the Coast Guard did not accurately record all interdictions, with 58% of counter drug case files not containing seizure results and 68% not containing required documentation.
"Without addressing the issues identified in this report, the Coast Guard may be missing opportunities to meet target goals of removing cocaine and reducing the illicit flow of drugs coming into the country," the report concluded.
It recommended that the Coast Guard develop a drug interdiction contingency plan to prioritize the availability of cutters and also update systems to ensure data accuracy, including a centralized database.
The Coast Guard agreed with the recommendations except for the contingency plan, which it said would be "redundant and not effective to resolve the documented issue of asset availability."
The Coast Guard also said it "remains committed to strengthening its tactics, techniques, and procedures to stop the illicit flow of drugs entering the United States by disrupting the flow of cocaine and other illegal drugs in the maritime environment."
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