The Trump administration has declared that eight Latin American organised crime groups are terrorist organisations, putting pressure on Mexico’s government and raising the prospect of US military intervention in the region to dismantle them.
Six of the groups on the list are based in Mexico, including its two largest drug trafficking outfits, the Sinaloa Cartel and the Jalisco New Generation Cartel.
The other two are Venezuela’s Tren de Aragua and El Salvador’s Mara Salvatrucha known as MS-13, according to a public notice published on Wednesday.
US President Donald Trump has promised to “wage war” on drug cartels, particularly over their role supplying the deadly opioid fentanyl, which is a leading cause of death among young people in the US. He has accused the Mexican government of an “intolerable alliance” with the groups.
“I think Mexico is largely run by the cartels and that’s a sad thing to say, and if they wanted help with that, we’d give them help,” Trump said on Tuesday.
Mexico’s government has previously rejected this characterisation and blames the US for providing the groups with high-calibre weapons and for failing to investigate money laundering from drug sales on American soil.
It has also long pushed back against the inclusion of cartels involved in drug trafficking and extortion on the foreign terrorist organisation (FTO) list alongside militant groups such as Islamic State and Hizbollah, saying the two require different solutions.
In recent years, the cartels have deepened their territorial control in Mexico, keeping murders and disappearances near record highs.
The designation comes as Mexico is engaged in tense discussions with the Trump administration across security and migration to try to avoid a 25 per cent tariff on most of its exports.
Leftwing President Claudia Sheinbaum said on Wednesday that the US could call groups what it liked but that she would defend Mexico’s sovereignty.
“If this decree is about extraterritorial actions, we don’t accept that, we think that it’s true we have to advance in joint investigations,” she said. “We don’t accept the violation of our sovereignty.”
The decision comes amid growing reports of greater use of US reconnaissance drones over Mexico to gather intelligence on the groups. Experts say it also raises the possibility of US drone strikes on Mexican territory.
“This declaration fuses two efforts that were born separately; the war on terror and the war on drugs,” said Víctor Hernández a Mexican national security expert and professor at the Panamerican University.
“You take drugs out of the public security sphere and put it firmly in the logic of military threat.”
Representatives from Mexico’s financial sector said it would also be affected. Though bigger banks already have to comply with strict global anti-money laundering rules, the US sanctions would be worse for any rule- breaking, including asset freezes and criminal penalties.
Smaller and mid-sized banks, particularly ones that rely on a third-party bank for transactions with the US, could be more affected, they said.
“I think the banks will have to be even more careful in complying with the law,” said Carlos Serrano, chief economist at BBVA Mexico.
