New Mexico Attorney General Raúl Torrez announced a formal criminal investigation this week into allegations that the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration knowingly let hundreds of thousands of fentanyl pills flood into New Mexico communities between 2023 and 2025. The investigation follows reporting by the Associated Press and the Albuquerque Journal that DEA agents operating in Albuquerque monitored large fentanyl shipments under wiretap authority, confirmed their delivery, and stood down—all in pursuit of bigger fish up the cartel food chain. The pills walked. The people died.

The whistleblower at the center of this is David Howell, a 19-year DEA veteran who filed his complaint in mid-2023. Howell alleged that more than 300,000 fentanyl pills reached Albuquerque streets as of September 2024 alone, with agents under a special DOJ protocol directing them not to seize the drugs during active wiretap investigations. Court records confirm that multiple fentanyl transactions were monitored and allowed to complete. In one documented instance, agents watched 74,000 pills get delivered to a mobile home park in Albuquerque and did nothing. Not a pill seized. No arrests were made.

The DEA's public posture? It's "One Pill Can Kill" campaign — a public awareness initiative warning that even a few milligrams of fentanyl can be lethal. The agency was running television spots about how deadly fentanyl is while simultaneously watching truckloads of the stuff roll into American neighborhoods. Walter White at least had the self-awareness to know he was the bad guy. These agents apparently convinced themselves they were the heroes — cooking up the justification in the same lab where the bodies were........

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