Securing the border is one of the most pressing issues for American voters, and the November election made President Trump’s mandate clear. Trump’s secure border policies are now being implemented, but we’re already hearing the familiar media spin.
There is no credible argument to support that Biden’s approach to border security was “the most secure” or that illegal crossings decreased during his tenure. In fact, the opposite was true. Biden’s border numbers surged to unprecedented levels, and as a result, countless innocent children and families were placed in harm’s way. It was a self-inflicted crisis and the President is right to address it with urgency. Below are the numbers directly from U.S. Customs and Border Protection going back to 2012:


Under the Obama and Biden administrations, the Left dominated the narrative, whether in the mainstream media or online discussions. As a result, President Trump faced significant obstacles in enforcing border policies during his first term, including relentless opposition from progressives and the media. He will continue to face these same divisive narratives and brutal lawfare as he moves forward. The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) must confront these issues directly with clear, specific actions or risk getting drowned out by the prevailing media noise and gaslighting.
The divided between the Right and Left on this issue is largely unnecessary. One of the biggest challenges for Border Czar Tom Homan and the future Secretary of DHS, Kristi Noem, will be to convince those who didn’t vote for Trump of the necessity of policies that secure our borders. Porous borders are unsafe for everyone—Americans and migrants alike. Progressive groups and their media allies would have you believe that Trump’s secure border policies and offering humane immigration policies are mutually exclusive, but they are not. Most Americans want safe communities and support legal pathways for immigrants who wish to assimilate and contribute.
For the Trump administration to succeed, it will be crucial to refine its messaging, helping Americans see the connection between strong policies that promote lawful immigration and those that protect vulnerable children and families seeking a better life. One effective way to strengthen this message is by drawing on the expertise of those who understand the realities of migration—those who have experienced it firsthand.
Enter Alicia Hopper and Dr. Jarrod Sadulski, two extraordinary humanitarians who are deeply invested in border security and the welfare of migrants. Through their powerful in-country research in Central America, Mexico, and the Southwest Border including interviews with trafficking victims and imprisoned cartel members , they are more convinced than ever that Trump’s secure border policies are not only necessary but will save thousands of innocent lives.
Sadulski brings two decades of law enforcement experience , specializing in human trafficking, organized crime, and counterterrorism. Hopper is a paralegal and a nationally recognized counter-trafficking expert. Together they founded a nonprofit, GUARD Against Trafficking, in early January. Having just returned from their latest trip to the border, they are now preparing for their next mission in Colombia in three weeks. Both have testified before Senate and House Homeland Security Committees multiple times over the past six months, offering crucial insights into the complex realities of border security.
Through this series, I aim to make my two hours with them count. The goal is to amplify their sobering stories and bring their insights back to the forefront. In a rational world, their work would inspire all Americans to support sensible, effective border policies. Below is a Fox news hit from Hopper in September, 2024 about the way open border policies have failed children:
The Media Never Tells the Right Stories: Human Trafficking and Human Smuggling
Human trafficking and human smuggling are different sides of the same coin. Both almost always involve cartels. Both are lucrative, capitalizing on human suffering and fear. Not all who are smuggled are trafficked, but a very high percentage of the economically disadvantaged are exploited either for sex or for labor of some kind. The average age of a trafficked child is 12 years old.
Human smuggling is the transportation of migrants. The poorest migrants pay cartels dearly for illegal transport to the U.S. Human trafficking exploits children and adults by forcing them to work in sex trades or in factories to pay off their debts to the cartels. According to Sadulski, during the four years of the Biden administration, there was a “2500% increase in cartel trafficking.” Since 2021 over 320,000 unaccompanied children (UC) have vanished, according to the August 2024 Office of the Inspector General (OIG) Report for the Department of Homeland Security (DHS).
I asked Hopper and Sadulski to explain their urgency to share their experiences at the border. They have traveled to the California and Texas borders, to Mexico and Central America. Their core issue rests with the current news narrative; a narrative that fails to capture the true tragedy of open border policies:
“The media,” Hopper stated, “Does not want to speak with anyone related to counter human trafficking. They never want to talk with border patrol or the people like us who research what is happening at the border. They rarely even address the border at all. But now the winds have changed and they are developing fear campaigns that focus on the border shut down, the ways the migrants are allegedly being hurt, and showing images of crying women who are now stuck in Mexico.”
“So, instead of talking about the meaningful steps being taken by Homan and ICE to mitigate this self-inflicted crisis by going after and removing the worst criminals first,” said Hopper. “The media never wants to talk with anyone about the realities of trafficking, the cartels, and the criminals coming into this country.”
“We went to the border the weekend of the inauguration. We saw a woman in tears but it wasn’t because she was stuck in Mexico. She was badly injured, could not walk on her own, clutching her six-year-old child. She was abandoned by her smuggler because of the injury, left in a remote area on U.S. soil where they would likely have died had we not intervened. We carried her to the roadway where she could contact Border Patrol to assist her. To be clear, we did not carry her across the border, “Jarrod added.
Hopper continued, “Before this weekend, the media showed nothing of the exploitation of migrants, the harm inflicted on children and Americans because of the cartels, and an open border. They are showing the horrors of the wrong thing.”

The firsthand accounts relayed by Hopper and Sadulski are beyond horrifying. They “look in the eyes of parents who have been victimized to levels that people just cannot comprehend” –stories of parents who are afraid to let go of their children, even in migrant shelters where they are supposed to feel safe. Why? Because, for one, they are profoundly traumatized by the cartels who grab their children, raping them on migratory trails in front of their parents to create the kind of terror that holds them hostage. Fear and coercion make these disadvantaged families comply with the cartels’ demands for money and labor, whether it is for sex trade or working in a factory under duress.
Trafficking: Organ Harvesting
Some cartel families focus on harvesting and trafficking organs. Merida, Mexico is a center of organ harvesting for one of those families. The operation provides valuable organs for organ transplant tourism. It is one of the “most lucrative illegal activities worldwide, making it very difficult to eradicate.” Global illegal organ trade generates $840 million to $1.7 billion annually, according to a 2017 report by think tank Global Financial Integrity (GFI). The rich travel to hospitals in Mexico and other countries where they buy organs that would otherwise require years of waiting in the U.S.
Hopper and Sadulski have gained the trust of and interviewed incarcerated current and former cartel members about organ harvesting operations. A trusted cartel source said that a Colombian man named Turco sends cartel members into migrant shelters in Mexico and Venezuela, convincing parents to hand over their children with their documents with the promise that the child will be reunited with the family in the U.S. Sadly, because the mother agrees to hand the child over to the trafficker, the child goes willingly, never to be seen again. “The last organ that we are aware of that Turco harvested was the right eye of a 12-year-old boy for $15,000,” said Sadulski.
As for the operation in Merida, Mexico, Hopper and Sadulski are in regular contact with an incarcerated cartel member whose family runs the Merida organ harvesting operation. In this operation, cartel members grab children from parks and schools in Mexico and bring them to veterinary clinics and other locations around the city of Merida where surgeons willingly or are forced to remove their organs for transplant tourism.
The prevailing narratives fail to capture the horrors that drive President Trump’s secure border policies. His administration must communicate these realities with clear, granular specificity. Americans need to confront the full scope of these dangers to protect against the existential threats posed by the gross mismanagement of our borders. It is a multibillion-dollar business that encompasses not just human smuggling and drug trafficking– killing millions of Americans–but also human trafficking, child sex and labor exploitation and, yes, the clandestine and lucrative business of organ harvesting.
*Please look for the upcoming second article in this series covering traffickers who harvest organs in Mexico and Central America.