Vice President Kamala Harris claimed during an Oct. 7 interview that President Joe Biden’s administration cut the flow of fentanyl into America by half. 

Verdict: Unsubstantiated 

There is no available data on the amount of fentanyl that has entered the country.

Fact Check: 

Harris has promised that if she becomes president, recreational marijuana will be fully legalized on a federal level for adults, according to The Guardian. Former President Donald Trump and President Joe Biden have supported partial legalization, but Harris is the first to say federal legalization is a priority, the outlet reported.

Harris claimed that the Biden administration has halved the flow of fentanyl into the U.S. in an Oct. 7 interview with 60 Minutes. “We have cut the flow of fentanyl by half, but we need Congress to be able to act to actually fix the problem,” Harris says around the 10:34 timestamp of the video.

This claim appears to be unsubstantiated.  U.S. Customs and Border Protections (CBP) has data on the quantity of drugs seized at the border by pounds. The amount of fentanyl seizures has increased since Biden took office in 2021. Fiscal year (FY) 2021 showed 11,201 pounds, 14,700 pounds in FY 2022, 27,023 pounds in FY 2023 and 21,000 pounds in FY 2024.

There is no data to ascertain whether or not this means an increase or decrease in the total amount of fentanyl entering the country. Additional CBP data shows a significant increase in fentanyl seizures starting in 2015, with 70 in FY 2015 climbing to 2,545 in FY 2019. (RELATED: JD Vance Claims Kamala Harris Plagiarized Sections Of Her Book)

The Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) directed Check Your Fact to its home page via email to view updated statistics on fentanyl seizures. At the time of writing, it says over 47,700,000 fentanyl pills and over 5,818 pounds of fentanyl powder were seized in 2024. The DEA states it “seized more than 80 million fentanyl laced fake pills and nearly 12,000 pounds of fentanyl powder in 2023.”

(Screenshot from DEA website)

Jonathan Caulkins, public policy professor at H. Guyford Stever University, told Check Your Fact via email that the amount of fentanyl shipped is equal to the amount seized and the amount delivered.

“All we see in the data is amounts seized. We don’t know amounts shipped or delivered. Criminals don’t tell us those quantities,” Caulkins said. “And there is no way to know for sure what is happening with amounts shipped or delivered based on what we see that gets seized.” 

Check Your Fact reached out to spokespeople for the Harris campaign and CBP for comment.