smuggler

noun

smug·​gler ˈsmə-glər 

plural smugglers

: one who smuggles something

The traffic in drugs—especially cocaine—to Florida by sea and air from South America has been generating wealth to rival that of the tourist trade and attracting a cadre of ingenious and ruthless smugglers from around the world.

—Jeremiah Tax

In nearby Nogales smugglers tunnel 6 ft. under the border and funnel people through.

—Terry McCarthy

Officials in Paraguay raided a wildlife smuggling operation in its capital city, Asunción, on March 25, recovering two critically endangered Brazilian parrots, which Paraguayan smugglers had hoped to sell in West Germany for $40,000.

—Focus

Synonyms

• bootlegger
• contrabandist
• courier
• runner

Examples of smuggler in a Sentence

during Prohibition, smugglers of alcohol did a brisk business

Recent Examples on the Web

From Mexico: She and her daughter were locked without food in a hotel room for a day, where smugglers were demanding an additional thousand dollars before the two of them would be allowed to continue to the border. —Jordan Salama, The New Yorker, 6 Jan. 2025

The 50-year-old is the latest to be sentenced in a network of human remains smugglers that stretched from the morgue of the Harvard University Medical School to an Arkansas mortuary. —Michael Loria, USA TODAY, 4 Jan. 2025

All that effort and creativity, but the alleged smugglers did not get away with it this time. —Popular Science Team, Popular Science, 25 Dec. 2024

Yet sanctions seemed not to touch those who rose to wealth during the war: looters, smugglers, and war profiteers protected by the regime. —Loubna Mrie, The Atlantic, 20 Dec. 2024

Word History

First Known Use

1661, in the meaning defined above