This piece was written by Greg Cunningham, Republican Candidate for NM-02

My understanding of New Mexico’s drug crisis did not merely come from a report or a briefing. I worked it from the inside as an undercover narcotics detective, as an officer commissioned by the DEA, and as a Marine who learned what a secure perimeter looks like and what it costs when it fails.

Fentanyl is the leading cause of death for Americans ages 18 to 45. Not car accidents. Not cancer. Fentanyl manufactured in cartel labs, moved through the same corridors that illegal crossings use, distributed into communities like ours while Congress debated talking points.

Those are not strangers dying. Those are our kids, our neighbors, our families.

In August 2024, we got the call no family should ever get. Our nephew was gone. Fentanyl. He was not a statistic. He was a father. He left behind two children who will grow up without him, and a family that will carry that hole for the rest of their lives.

I have sat with that loss. I know what it weighs. No parent, no child, no New Mexican should have to live through what we lived through. That is not a policy position. That is why I am running.

The enforcement picture has changed. Border crossings are down sharply. Fentanyl seizures at the southern border have been cut nearly in half. Drug deaths are falling. That progress is real, and it matters, and the single most important thing Congress can do right now is make sure it holds.

Results built on policy guidance can be reversed overnight. What this district needs is someone in Washington who will fight to lock these gains into law: codify the end of catch-and-release, put mandatory detention in statute, and designate fentanyl trafficking for what it is, a national security threat, not just a drug crime.

My opponent, Gabe Vasquez, represents 180 miles of the southern border and voted against the Laken Riley Act three times. He then went to a town hall and bragged about it. The Laken Riley Act required federal agencies to detain illegal migrants arrested or charged with violent crimes. It passed with bipartisan support.

Vasquez voted no three times and called it an act of courage. He also voted against the FY26 Department of Homeland Security appropriations bill. He did not serve in law enforcement. He has not worked on these cases, and his voting record shows it. That is not a close comparison.

The people doing the hardest work in this fight are not in Washington. They are sheriffs, deputies, and local narcotics units operating in High Intensity Drug Trafficking Areas (HIDTA), designations that bring federal resources and coordination to the corridors where this poison actually moves. These task forces work because local officers know the territory, the communities, and the players in ways no federal agency ever will.

Congress funds that infrastructure. I will fight to protect it, expand it, and make sure the men and women running those operations have what they need.

New Mexico deserves a congressman who has actually stood on that line, not just visited it for a photo. Someone who knows that an understaffed DEA field office is not a budget line, it is a signal to cartels that the door is cracked open. Someone who will fight for Border Patrol agents stationed right here in our district and for the state and local officers who carry this fight every single day.

I have worked this fight. I know how this enemy operates. And I know what it costs when we lose.