It’s hard to keep track of all the ways that the United States has changed since Donald Trump returned to the White House in January. Sources tell WIRED that ant smugglers in the US have been emboldened by widespread government staffing cuts spearheaded by the so-called Department of Government Efficiency. The United States Department of Agriculture’s Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service, which operates a program to stop the smuggling of invertebrate pests, was hit especially hard. In a particularly turbulent moment in the United States, a rise in this kind of extremely niche and relatively harmless type of criminal activity could get lost. Some say they’ve witnessed a change in the smuggling ecosystem since the Trump administration began making steep cuts to the federal government, including the USDA.