Coalition Raises Concerns That Messaging App Enables Fentanyl Trafficking, Money Laundering

WeChat Letter

TRENTON – Attorney General Matthew J. Platkin joined a bipartisan coalition of six attorneys general demanding answers from WeChat over concerns that the Chinese messaging app is a key enabler of fentanyl trafficking and illegal money laundering in the United States.

“We will use every available resource to track down and bring to justice the criminal cartels and ringleaders who seek to bring fentanyl into our state. As part of these ongoing efforts, we’re making crystal clear today that we and our fellow attorneys general will hold accountable tech companies that are complicit in fentanyl trafficking and money laundering,” said Attorney General Platkin. “Fentanyl has taken too many lives, and we will continue to do everything in our power to pursue ringleaders and cartels and protect our residents.”

WeChat, owned by Chinese technology company Tencent, is a messaging and payment app used by over a billion people in China and over 19 million people in the United States, including in New Jersey. Several law enforcement and financial crime investigations have revealed that WeChat allows for fentanyl traffickers to communicate about how to launder money from fentanyl and other drug sales.

WeChat is encrypted, so traffickers use the app to move millions of dollars in cash from the United States through a complicated set of transactions to China, and then to Mexico, where the bulk of fentanyl is produced.

In New Jersey and in the United States, it is illegal to launder drug money. The attorneys general are demanding that WeChat provide specific answers to the states in the next 30 days about what steps WeChat is taking to stop this dangerous and unlawful activity from taking place on their platform.

Across the country, WeChat has played a key role in several fentanyl trafficking operations that have been the subject of criminal prosecutions, including:

• The 2021 conviction of money launderer Xizhi Li for running a transnational criminal ring using WeChat to move bulk cash between Chinese financial operations and drug cartels.

• Operation Chem Capture, a 2023 incident where eight companies and 12 people were indicted for using apps, including WeChat, to sell the chemicals used to make fentanyl.

• Last month, the U.S. Department of Justice arrested and charged three members of an international money laundering ring in South Carolina for allegedly using WeChat to launder money from fentanyl sales.

As the letter notes, despite this pattern of misuse, it is unclear whether WeChat has taken any action to address the issues in its app that facilitate fentanyl trafficking and money laundering. The letter demands answers from WeChat.

The other attorneys general signing the letter are North Carolina Attorney General Jeff Jackson, South Carolina Attorney General Alan Wilson, Colorado Attorney General Phil Weiser, Mississippi Attorney General Lynn Fitch, and New Hampshire Attorney General John Formella.

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