MEXICO CITY — In the last year, Mexican troops have been deployed across the country to quell narco-violence, arresting legions of cartel operatives, seizing tons of illicit drugs and busting hundreds of clandestine laboratories.
Skipping the usual extradition process, Mexico shipped scores of cartel suspects to the United States to face justice, an unprecedented step.
And, in the most sensational recent blow to organized crime, Mexican special forces last month tracked down and killed Nemesio Rubén Oseguera Cervantes, known as “El Mencho,” the long-elusive boss of the notorious Jalisco New Generation cartel.
A return to the war on drugs?
No way, insists President Claudia Sheinbaum.
“We want peace, not war,” she said last week. “The strategy has not changed.”
Many beg to differ.
Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum is shown with the secretary of the Mexican navy, Raymundo Pedro Morales Ángeles.
(Cristopher Rogel Blanquet / Getty Images)
Opposition lawmakers and others are celebrating what they call Sheinbaum’s de facto break with the controversial “hugs not bullets” approach of former President Andrés Manuel López Obrador, Sheinbaum’s predecessor and mentor.
López Obrador ditched the militarized “war on drugs” of previous administrations, which he said only inflamed violence and turned Mexico “into a graveyard.” He focused instead on attacking the root causes of crime, including poverty and scant opportunities for the young.
Many mocked his experiment as a failure: During López Obrador’s six-year term, homicides and disappearances reached record levels and cartels expanded their turf.
The fall of Oseguera is widely seen as an exclamation point marking the demise of what critics viewed as López Obrador’s passive approach.
“The end of the hugs,” read a headline in Mexico’s Excélsior newspaper.
“The idea that organized crime would withdraw in the face of official inaction or benevolence only permitted an exponential growth of criminal groups, endowing them with a sense of impunity,” wrote Excélsior columnist Pascal Beltrán del Río.
For Sheinbaum, the takedown of Oseguera may have had another effect: Fending off President Trump’s oft-stated desire to intervene in Mexico’s cartel wars — a red line for the president. She calls direct U.S. involvement a violation of Mexico’s sovereignty.
The operation targeting Oseguera involved the use of intelligence from Washington, but no U.S. troops participated in the raid, according to U.S. and Mexican officials.
“Sheinbaum has demonstrated that cooperation and intelligence-sharing can produce the results that Trump desires, and that Mexican troops are equipped to take down high-value targets,” said David Mora of the International Crisis Group, a Brussels-based nonprofit focused on conflict resolution.
Even as her hard-line tactics have shown some success, Sheinbaum has not renounced the precepts of López Obrador, who, while retired, remains a revered and influential figure.
“President Sheinbaum doesn’t want to contradict Andrés Manuel,” said Victor Manuel Sánchez Valdés, a security analyst, referring to López Obrador, who founded the now-dominant Morena party that Sheinbaum represents. “But at the end of the day, it’s clear that ‘hugs not bullets’ didn’t produce the desired results.”
Despite the slaying of Oseguera, Sheinbaum has a long way to go in taming deeply entrenched cartels. Police, judges, prosecutors and other elements of Mexico’s criminal justice apparatus remain ill-equipped to confront the well-armed, billion-dollar mobs that dominate vast swaths of the nation.
Sheinbaum, detractors say, has fallen especially short in confronting one key challenge: Purging corrupt politicians, law enforcement officials and other authorities, including those linked to her ruling party. Hand-written ledgers found at Oseguera’s mountain hideout point to an institutionalized system of bribes regularly paid to officials in cahoots with the cartel.
“The government continues to protect actors who have a lot of political clout,” said Sánchez Valdés. “There is a continued tolerance for corruption.”
Pressure from Trump is not the only factor pushing Sheinbaum to move decisively against the criminal syndicates. While the president boasts 70%-plus approval ratings, many in Mexico are fed up with the rampant lawlessness.
A significant number of people favor additional U.S. involvement in Mexico’s battle against organized crime, surveys show. Some Mexicans even say they wouldn’t object to U.S. boots on the ground.
It’s no surprise then, that the undisputed star of Sheinbaum’s Cabinet is the tough-talking security minister, Omar García Harfuch, the face of the government’s anti-cartel offensive. García Harfuch has considerable street cred: He survived three bullet wounds in a 2020 cartel assassination attempt that cost the lives of two bodyguards and a bystander. His frequent rollouts of cartel-busting exploits have become a hallmark of her administration.
García Harfuch also served as Sheinbaum’s security aide during her previous stint as mayor of Mexico City. Her administration succeeded in bringing down crime in the capital, which now sees fewer killings per capita than many U.S. cities. But many questioned whether her favored techniques — relying heavily on intelligence gathering and cooperation among law enforcement agencies — would work on a national scale. The attack on Oseguera’s hideout dramatized Sheinbaum’s willingness to accept a more kinetic approach, despite the risks.
A cadet trains at Mexico City’s police academy. Crime in Mexico’s capital plummeted to record lows under Sheinbaum, with fewer killings per capita than in many U.S. cities.
(Gary Coronado / Los Angeles Times)
Sheinbaum remains a staunch supporter of educational, sports and cultural activities to provide youth alternatives to joining cartels — which rank among the nation’s largest employers and are lionized in ballads, TV programs and films.
“Our idea is that young people never view crime as a life option,” Sheinbaum said. “Crime is an option of death.”
Mexico has largely returned to normal since Oseguera’s death and the spasm of lawlessness that followed.
But, as the country prepares to host World Cup matches in Mexico City, Monterrey and Guadalajara, many worry about new outbreaks of violence. Past cartel leadership voids have resulted in protracted battles for power, as would-be successors of departed capos vie for control.
“Claiming a top criminal scalp will not spare the government from a messy aftermath,” said Mora of the International Crisis Group.
Mexicans are well aware of the risks.
“History shows us that the fall of an important narco does not reduce violence — on the contrary, violence multiplies, like an evil weed,” said Rodolfo Soto, 54, a minivan driver in Puerto Vallarta.
A storied tourist destination in Jalisco state, Puerto Vallarta was among the hardest-hit areas during retaliatory attacks following Oseguera’s killing. The city largely shut down as residents and tourists ran for cover and plumes of smoke from fires darkened the Pacific vista.
“We are all afraid that this could get worse and we will be caught in the middle,” Soto said. “Tourism is our lifeblood here.”
One thing is clear: Few Mexicans appear to be mourning the seeming passing of the “hugs not bullets” era.
“I never supported the whole ‘hugs not bullets’ policy,” said Marisol Morales, 41, an assistant elementary school principal in the Pacific port city of Manzanillo. “How can you hug people who are committing crimes?”
Special correspondent Cecilia Sánchez Vidal in Mexico City and Times staff writer Karen Mariana Cárdenas Ceballos in Los Angeles contributed to this report.
