Bellingcat and Latin American investigative partner El Clip reviewed more than 100 posts that use TikTok to advertise alleged smuggling services. Out of all the TikTok posts, the account of a man who goes by the name Maldonado stood out.
The overall narrative of the account implies it has information about smuggling services. With 150,000 followers, scores of people requested information about being smuggled or working as a smuggler.
For instance, in dozens of posts he poses with a walkie talkie next to a body of water, implying it is the Rio Grande/Rio Bravo, through location pins or other references.
In another case a video of a border patrol vehicle posted on his account included audio that we found posted on YouTube nine years earlier. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7dTC-zmEqGM
When we contacted the TikTok account holder for comment, he told us he helps people cross the US-Mexico border undetected and claimed he doesn’t charge for his services, has no arrangements with organised crime and is motivated only to help people.
Guadalupe Correa-Cabrera an expert in immigration, border security and human trafficking who viewed the account told us it was definitely set up to give the impression he was involved in smuggling, but his portrayal of narcoculture and smuggling activities was “cartoonish”.
We asked Maldonado how he gets away with smuggling people without permission or being stopped by drug cartels, he said: “They can’t stop me. They call me the Phantom of Tamaulipas ” …
We found songs had been published about him as recently as 2023. Singing about Maldonado’s alleged biography and his origins in Honduras as well as some details of his alleged smuggling services using semi-trailer trucks. One line in one song begins: “Everyday I traffic people…”
Semi-trailers or lorries have been used to smuggle many migrants across Mexico and the US-Mexico border, sometimes with fatal consequences. Read the full investigative series coordinated by Telemundo and El Clip here: https://www.elclip.org/traileres-trampa-para-migrantes/
A TikTok spokesperson told us: "We have zero tolerance for content that facilitates human smuggling. We continue to work closely with law enforcement and industry partners to find and remove content of this nature."
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