Attorney General Bondi Announces Largest Fentanyl Bust in U.S. History Against the Sinaloa Cartel
May 6, 2025 · The Justice Department · 0:18:05
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What happened
Attorney General Pamela Bondi — who is not among the officials tracked by name on this site, so this page is tagged with no tracked official — announced what she called the largest fentanyl bust in the nation’s history, standing with the agents and prosecutors behind her. She said the multi-agency operation, led by the DEA with local, state, tribal and federal partners, targeted one of the largest and most dangerous drug trafficking and foreign terrorist organizations in the country — the Sinaloa cartel — and marked, in her words, the most significant victory in the nation’s fight against fentanyl and drug trafficking to date, as she stated it.
Bondi said the DEA seized 11.5 kilos of fentanyl, including an astounding approximately 3 million fentanyl pills — the largest seizure in the nation’s history — stamped as oxycodone but containing varying strengths of fentanyl, as she stated the figures. She said the head of the organization in this country, Alberto Salazar Amaya, was living in Salem, Oregon, that six of those arrested were in the country illegally, and that the drugs were in Albuquerque, Phoenix and Utah — illustrating, she said, how insulated cartel leaders make themselves. She listed the wider seizure as approximately $5 million in cash and cars, 35 kilos of methamphetamine, 7.5 kilos of cocaine, 4.5 kilos of heroin and 49 rifles and pistols, and said the operation was made possible by over 55,000 hours of law enforcement investigation, according to her remarks.
Bondi said the precursors are made in China, sent to Mexico and brought into the United States, and warned that fentanyl is put into Xanax, Adderall, Molly, cocaine and marijuana to create addiction; she said 75,000 Americans are dying each year because of fentanyl, as she stated the figure. She said there will be no negotiating with those arrested: if convicted, they will be put behind bars for as long as humanly possible, according to her remarks. She thanked DEA Principal Deputy Administrator Rob Murphy, DEA El Paso Division Special Agent in Charge Omar Arellano and U.S. Attorney Ryan Ellison, as she named them.
Why it matters
Bondi’s figures — 3 million fentanyl pills in a single Sinaloa operation, by her account — made this the administration’s benchmark fentanyl seizure announcement, and her no-negotiation sentencing posture is the Justice Department’s stated policy for cartel traffickers.
Sources: The Justice Department, “Attorney General Pamela Bondi, DEA, & USAO New Mexico Announce Results of Historic Drug Bust”, 2025-05-06 (official upload, embedded above; published 2025-05-06). Transcript via Supadata (private research store, paraphrased and attributed, not republished). All figures and characterizations as stated by the speakers.