Arguments against "building the wall" include refuting the claim that it will reduce drug trafficing by saying that most drugs come in through legal ports of entry. There has always been something about that claim that seemed "off" to me, but I haven't really cared enough to really analyze it. My immediate thought went along lines of, "If drugs are coming in through legal ports of entry, and we know it, why aren't we stopping them?"
Well, it seems that we actually are, because it now turns out that the argument regarding the wall, and that it won't reduce trug trafficing, is based on a claim that 97% of drug interdiction is made at legal ports of entry, while only 3% of drug interdiction is made in areas where the wall would be built.
Does the amount of drugs being stopped at various points say anything about the amount of drugs not being stopped? Not really, but if it does it says the opposite of the point wall opponents are trying to make. If large amounts are being stopped, it would imply that very small amounts are getting through, so the fact that almost all of the drugs we are stopping are stopped at legal ports of entry would imply that legal ports of entry is the least successful method of importing drugs, not the favored one as opponents of the wall suggest.
It seems to me that this means that wall opponents are making, then, an argument in favor of building the wall, rather than one against it.
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