Chinese gangsters are taking advantage of a patchwork of marijuana legislation across the United States to expand their criminal enterprises, setting up shop in states like Oklahoma where medicinal marijuana is legal and where few rules exist to limit growing operations. This has unleashed a wave of violence and lawlessness that deserves more attention from state governments and from the Biden administration.
A recent investigation by ProPublica and The Frontier revealed how the Chinese mafia took over the illicit marijuana trade by exploiting Oklahoma state laws. In that state, there are no restrictions on the number of marijuana growing operations that a person can have as long as the owner of those operations has been a state resident for more than two years.
While some states have moved toward decriminalizing the possession and farming of cannabis, Texas is right to take a more cautious approach. As Oklahoma’s problems show, marijuana farming has created fertile ground for all sorts of criminal activity. Lax federal enforcement of the illegal marijuana trade has also been a boon to the Chinese underworld.
Texas outlaws the possession of marijuana, only allowing use of medicinal marijuana for some patients under tightly controlled conditions. But the criminality of the Chinese mafia in Oklahoma, New York and elsewhere is spilling into our state. You might remember that Texas authorities revealed last year that they were tricked into sending thousands of driver’s licenses from Asian-American Texans to other states. Many of these documents were sent to marijuana farms in Oklahoma. International crime analysts point out that cybercrime is a major focus of Chinese criminal groups and that they were early adopters of artificial intelligence tools.
Though transporting marijuana between states is still a federal crime, the Interstate 35 corridor in Texas, from the border city of Laredo to Oklahoma, has become a drug trafficking route. Evidence shows that Chinese mafias launder money for Mexican cartels and exploit immigrants through sex trafficking and human trafficking, forcing many of them to work in marijuana farms.
These groups are notoriously secretive and disciplined. Current and former Drug Enforcement Administration officials told ProPublica that federal agencies lack enough personnel who are fluent in Chinese languages and have enough knowledge of the culture to investigate and infiltrate these groups.
Nevertheless, the federal government can’t sit back and watch this threat grow. There is growing evidence of links between the mafias and the Chinese Communist Party.
According to the Brookings Institution think tank, the mafias act as “extralegal enforcers” of the Chinese diaspora on behalf of Beijing against those who speak up against the government. In exchange, the criminal groups get protection from the Chinese Communist Party.
In February, 50 members of Congress, including several from the Texas delegation, asked the Department of Justice to explain what federal resources are being devoted to investigating Chinese involvement in marijuana farms and whether states’ legalization of marijuana has contributed to their proliferation.
This is a national security issue, full stop. The federal government must treat it with the urgency it deserves.
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