Overview:
Haiti stays on the USA’ checklist of 23 main drug transit hubs, as traffickers proceed to make use of its territory for cocaine smuggling routes, in response to a designation lately submitted to Congress by the Trump administration. U.S. officers emphasize that inclusion on the checklist doesn’t replicate a rustic’s cooperation or enforcement efforts however as an alternative underscores Haiti’s geographic and legal position in regional trafficking.
PORT-AU-PRINCE — The Trump administration has stored Haiti on its checklist of 23 international locations thought-about main drug transit or manufacturing hubs, in response to a latest annual presidential willpower submitted to Congress. The nation has appeared on the checklist for 36 consecutive years.
The White Home emphasised that designation doesn’t essentially replicate a authorities’s enforcement efforts or cooperation with the U.S. to undercut traffickers. As a substitute, it’s based mostly on geography and financial components that make the nation a hub for trafficking.
In 1989, former President George H. W. Bush — together with Congress via a joint resolution — had labeled Haiti as a “main drug-transit nation” below the International Help Act of 1961, as a consequence of its position in facilitating the trafficking of narcotics into the USA.
“The explanation international locations are positioned on the checklist is the mix of geographic, business and financial components that permit medicine or precursor chemical substances to be transited or produced,” in response to a statement from the White Home’s communications workplace.
International locations on the 2025 checklist embody Haiti, the Bahamas, the Dominican Republic, Jamaica, Venezuela, Colombia and Mexico, together with a number of in Asia and Central America.
The willpower got here simply days earlier than U.S. federal prosecutors introduced a nine-year jail sentence for Jean Eliobert “Eddy One” Jasme, a trafficker who moved cocaine from Venezuela and Colombia via Haiti and the Dominican Republic earlier than routing it to the Bahamas and the U.S. His sentence additionally consists of 4 years of supervised launch and a $1 million penalty. He had admitted to planning to distribute greater than 500 grams of cocaine, realizing it might be introduced illegally into the USA.
“Traffickers use transshipment factors throughout Haiti…all through the Caribbean to succeed in the ultimate supply vacation spot, which is the USA of America — and we are going to monitor down each certainly one of these narco-traffickers.”
Kash Patel, FBI Director
Courtroom data present Jasme’s operation relied on boats and small planes till he was arrested by Haitian police in 2022 and extradited to the U.S.
At a Senate listening to on Sept. 16, the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) Director Kash Patel stated traffickers proceed to make use of Haitian territory to maneuver cocaine into U.S. markets. “A big portion of the cocaine coming from South America originates in Venezuela,” he stated, “and traffickers use transshipment factors throughout Haiti all through the Caribbean to succeed in the ultimate supply vacation spot, which is the USA.”
Document seizures in 2025 as extra trafficking networks are uncovered
Haitian Nationwide Police (PNH) recorded their largest-ever cocaine bust on July 13, when 1.05 tonnes of cocaine had been seized on Ile de la Tortue or Tortuga Island within the northwest. Authorities estimated the haul’s avenue worth at practically $29 million. The operation left one Jamaican suspect lifeless and one other Bahamian injured.
In line with native authorities, the vessel transporting the drug cargo was en path to the USA by way of the Bahamas and the Turks and Caicos Islands. Prosecutor Jeir Pierre said that legislation enforcement had been monitoring this route for years, however efforts had been hindered by restricted sources
Different instances this yr embody marijuana and cocaine seizures in Cap-Haïtien, Les Cayes and Aquin, together with a number of arrests, notably that of Samuel Luxamar within the south with practically a kilogram of marijuana in June.
Regardless of these seizures, analysts say Haiti’s position as a smuggling hub is deepening. Former Haitian Armed Forces Colonel Himmler Rébu lately instructed The Haitian Occasions that Haiti is “steadily shifting towards a narco-state,” with gangs offering cowl for worldwide networks working via ports and airspace.
“That is now not nearly native drug traffickers — it includes a transnational community working via Haiti’s ports and airspace below gang safety,” stated Rébu, chief of the political celebration Grand Rassemblement pour l’Évolution d’Haïti (GREH).
The United Nations has additionally flagged Haiti as a rising hub for narcotics and arms trafficking, with gangs utilizing income to gas violence. A February 2025 report famous customs seizures of each medicine and weapons, together with the involvement of Bahamian nationals in Caribbean smuggling rings.
Haiti’s continued designation as a drug transit hub, consultants say, displays not solely geography but additionally the impunity gangs and traffickers get pleasure from amid a weak justice system. With restricted state management and widespread corruption, worldwide cartels have discovered Haiti an indispensable node of their trafficking routes.