With Canada’s new fentanyl czar now in place, Public Safety Minister David McGuinty said the next step in the fight against the opioid crisis is to designate criminal cartels as terrorist entities under the country’s Criminal Code.
Speaking Wednesday at Toronto Pearson International Airport, McGuinty said that listing cartels as terrorist groups will give law enforcement, such as RCMP and local police, more authority and more powers to “follow the money and to look and see how criminal cartels are using sophisticated laundering tactics.”
“Right now in downtown Toronto, there’s a gathering of the leadership of the Public Safety Department with Finance Canada, with our fentanyl czar, and with our senior RCMP folks. They’re meeting with the six largest chartered banks in Canada,” he said during the media conference.
“They are inaugurating a new money laundering intelligence partnership and we’re going to be supporting the sharing of money laundering and organized crime intelligence between our six banks and law enforcement to deal with the fentanyl crisis in the trade thereof.”
He added that one of the most effective ways to tackle the fentanyl trade is to follow the money, cutting off the proceeds that fund organized crime — ultimately helping to dismantle the cartels profiting from dangerous and illegal drugs.
The announcement comes more than a week after Canada appointed a new fentanyl czar, part of the measures aimed at addressing concerns about border security made by United States President Donald Trump in tariff threats.
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It is part of Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s new intelligence directive on organized crime and fentanyl that will be backed by $200 million in spending.
Trump has threatened to impose tariffs on all imports from Canada and cited concerns about the flow of fentanyl and migrants across the border.
Sweeping 25 per cent tariffs were set to be imposed earlier this month. Trump agreed to delay those for 30 days, with Trudeau saying that Canada had committed to border measures, including the listing of cartels and a fentanyl czar in those talks.
The investment seems to be working, according to McGuinty.
“Just yesterday, I was made aware of new statistics from the customs and border patrol in the United States between December 2024 and the end of January 2025,” McGuinty said
“In the two-month period since the launching of our border plan, we’ve seen a 97 per cent reduction of the seizures of fentanyl going from Canada into the United States. So the investments we’re making on the frontlines are helping,” he added.
McGuinty concluded the media conference by saying that more details will be shared soon on the next steps to designate cartels as criminal organizations.
“But we know that by amending the Criminal Code to have criminal cartels now listed as terrorist groups, we will be helping law enforcement with some specific approaches to tracking and tracing money,” he said.
— With files from Global News’ Sean Previl
© 2025 Global News, a division of Corus Entertainment Inc.
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