Not Mexico or Venezuela: Researchers reveal what country was responsible for supplying fentanyl to the U.S.
DEA reports and a new study suggest China’s crackdown, not Venezuela, played the biggest role in falling U.S. overdose deaths.
Stopping illegal drugs, including fentanyl, from entering the United States and killing American citizens was one of President Donald Trump’s main justifications for capturing Nicolás Maduro and extracting him from Venezuela, as well as firing off threats at countries including Colombia and Mexico.
The Trump administration has repeatedly blamed “drug dealer” Maduro for the U.S. fentanyl crisis, even though recent annual National Drug Threat Assessment reports from the Drug Enforcement Administration do not list Venezuela as a fentanyl producer or trafficking hub.
Mexico “has to get its act together”
Those same reports do, however, identify two countries as posing a greater threat. The first is Mexico, with Trump issuing a direct warning to its president, Claudia Sheinbaum, just hours after Maduro’s capture.
“I like Claudia, I think that she’s a terrific person. I would say every single time I talk to her, I offer to send troops. But she’s concerned. She’s a little afraid. The cartels are running Mexico.
“We have to do something with Mexico,” Trump said ominously. “Mexico has to get its act together against drug trafficking. We’d love Mexico to do it. They’re capable of doing it, but unfortunately the cartels are very strong in Mexico.”
Mexico does appear on the DEA’s fentanyl threat list. Yet other evidence suggests another country may have had a far greater impact on overdose deaths from the synthetic opioid in the United States.
China: Why overdose deaths in the U.S. plummeted
According to a study published in the journal Science, there appears to be a correlation between a Chinese government crackdown on the illicit fentanyl trade and a sharp reduction in fentanyl overdoses on American soil.
In 2023, there were about 76,000 deaths from synthetic opioids, most notably fentanyl, in the United States. The following year, Joe Biden’s final year in office, that number dropped by more than a third. Data for 2025 is not yet available, although early indicators suggest the figure will continue to fall, if less dramatically.
During Trump’s first term, China agreed to impose internal restrictions on fentanyl-related substances. Even so, companies in China continued supplying precursor chemicals to Mexican criminal groups, which then produced illicit fentanyl in clandestine labs inside Mexico.
Beijing’s crackdown on fentanyl trade
Using data from U.S. and Canadian governments, as well as, somewhat bizarrely, Reddit discussions, researchers behind the recent study linked the decline in overdose deaths to Beijing taking a tougher stance against companies tied to the fentanyl trade.
The authors include Keith Humphreys, a former drug policy adviser to President Barack Obama. According to the Chinese Embassy, Beijing shut down 286 companies connected to the fentanyl trade between October 2023 and August 2025.
The DEA has also noted the shift. In its 2025 National Drug Threat Assessment, the agency said Chinese suppliers were “wary of supplying controlled precursors to its international customers, demonstrating an awareness on their part that the government of China is controlling more fentanyl precursors.”
Humphreys’ study reaches a blunt conclusion: “We suggest there was a major disruption in the illicit fentanyl trade, possibly tied to Chinese government actions, that translated into sharp reductions in overdose mortality beginning in mid- or late-2023 and continued into 2024 across both the U.S. and Canada.”
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