A DEA-protected witness said the Sinaloa Cartel gave López Obrador US$2 million for his 2006 presidential campaign, ProPublica revealed. “El Rey” Zambada, brother of “El Mayo,” testified during García Luna’s trial that he contributed US$7 million to the Morena campaign. Celso Ortega, leader of the criminal gang Los Ardillos, confessed that he personally delivered the money from Los Zetas to AMLO for his 2006 campaign.
In October 2019, President López Obrador acknowledged that he gave the order to release Ovidio Guzmán, “El Chapo’s” son, who had just been arrested. In March 2020, while touring Badiraguato, López Obrador got out of his truck to greet “El Chapo’s” mother. That day was Ovidio’s birthday, and Obrador was invited to the party.
In the 2021 elections, it was documented that organized crime helped Morena win the governorships in the Pacific region. Months later, Sergio Carmona, “The King of Huachicol,” was executed. He was accused of financing Morena’s campaigns. A Morena founder leaked audio recordings suggesting that Sinaloa Governor Rubén Rocha Moya received suitcases full of money from the Sinaloa Cartel for his campaigns. During the campaign, he declared—in an interview with journalist Carlos Loret de Mola—that governing Sinaloa required reaching an agreement with the drug trafficking cartels.
Americo Villarreal, currently the governor of Tamaulipas, was Morena’s deputy governor in that state and Rocha Moya’s campaign coordinator.
Donald Trump claimed during his presidential campaign that “the cartels run Mexico.” As president, he declared that Claudia Sheinbaum “is so afraid of the cartels that she can’t think straight.” In his first State of the Union address on Capitol Hill, he said that Mexico “is now entirely dominated by criminal cartels that murder, rape, torture, and exercise total control; they have total control over an entire nation.”
In her appearance before Congress, Attorney General Pam Bondi asked in a classified (secret) meeting whether the Mexican government was truly fighting the cartels, or just pretending to do so.
JD Vance, Vice President of the United States, declared: “Poor, sad Mexico. International drug cartels operate freely within its borders, and Mexico can do nothing about it.”
Earlier, Marco Rubio, now US Secretary of State, stated: “Much of Mexico’s national territory was handed over by Andrés Manuel López Obrador to drug traffickers.”
Tom Homan, border czar, declared: “Much of the Mexican military, much of the Mexican government, is corrupt.”
Terry Cole, Trump’s nominee to head the DEA, noted: “Mexican drug cartels work hand in hand with corrupt Mexican government officials at high levels… sometimes it’s hard to tell who’s who when you’re dealing with federal police, the military, the federal government, or the cartels.”
Republican Senator John Neely Kennedy emphasized: “Isn’t it a big part of the problem that President López Obrador, and now President Sheinbaum, are in the pockets of the Mexican drug cartels?”
A White House press release issued on February 2, 2025, stated clearly:
“Mexican drug trafficking organizations have an intolerable alliance with the government of Mexico. The government of Mexico has provided safe havens for cartels to engage in the manufacture and transportation of dangerous narcotics.”
The López Obrador administration removed DEA agents from Mexico in 2019. The United States captured drug lord Ismael “Mayo” Zambada, and the Mexican government was a mere spectator.
The Morena governor of Baja California had her visa revoked.
Reuters revealed that the United States government is pressuring Mexico to investigate politicians for links to drug trafficking.
The United States arrested Mexican boxer Julio César Chávez Jr. for alleged ties to the Sinaloa Cartel. The Mexican government acknowledged that Chávez Jr. has had an arrest warrant issued since 2023. He was not hiding. He was constantly posting on social media about his activities in Mexico and the United States.
The United States Treasury Department accused Alfonso Romo, the head of López Obrador’s Presidential Office, of laundering money for the Sinaloa Cartel.
The former Secretary of Security of Tabasco, Hernan Bermudez Requena, is identified by the Mexican Army as the leader of the criminal organization known as “La Barredora” and is accused of having ties to organized crime. He was a trusted confidant of former governor Adan Augusto Lopez and is now a fugitive with an Interpol red card.
Far from holding him accountable, Adan Augusto Lopez was appointed by AMLO as Secretary of the Interior, Chief of the Security Cabinet, and later a candidate for the Mexican presidency. He is currently a coordinator in the Senate, and the former president refers to him as “my brother.”
All of this information is verifiable and was taken from various media outlets.
