Firearms were used to commit 1,799 homicides in Texas in 2023—a devastating human toll. Yet guns purchased in Texas likely contribute to even more homicidal violence south of the border that empowers fentanyl traffickers and pushes more migrants toward the United States.
Of crime guns recovered in Mexico from 2017 to 2021 (among cases in which gun traces identified a country or U.S. state of origin), more than one of every four (29 percent) was sourced to Texas, according to new data from the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives (ATF).
More than 22,000 gun homicides occur in Mexico each year. With 29 percent of crime guns traced to purchases in Texas, that means 5,500 murders in Mexico likely involved guns from Texas. That’s three to four times as many gun homicides reported annually in the Lone Star State. (Texas had 1,799 homicides committed with firearms last year compared to 1,339 in 2019.)
