Photo by Eliezer Muller on Unsplash
In September, the United States Government Accountability Office (GAO) released a new report reviewing U.S. efforts to combat firearms trafficking to Mexico. Firearms Trafficking to Mexico: Better Data and Performance Monitoring Would Help Agencies Direct Resources to Counter Cartels offers recommendations for the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF); the Department of Homeland Security (DHS); and the State Department’s Bureau of International Narcotics and Law Enforcement Affairs (INL) to improve data collection and monitoring to fight such trafficking.
The GAO report found that while U.S. government agencies conduct various efforts to combat firearms trafficking, they do not assess the effectiveness of those efforts, concluding, “As a result, the agencies do not know the extent to which their efforts are meeting objectives and cannot determine whether they are directing resources to the most effective programs.”
The GAO report offered recommendations to improve data collection, develop objectives, goals, and desired outcomes of firearms trafficking programs, and to measure performance of such efforts to meet goals and outcomes.
Even these modest recommendations, however, have met resistance from the Trump Administration, with the Department of Homeland Security arguing “that it does not believe collecting data on types of firearms would fulfill its mission or provide sufficient operational benefit to justify the costs associated with the recommended action.”
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