Bad boy governor accused of narco links
Temperamental soccer start-turned politician Cuauhtémoc Blanco becomes the latest politician questioned for narco links – which he denies – as #SedenaLeaks hack exposes more elite-level rot
MORELOS STATE GOVERNOR FENDS OFF NARCO LINKS
Morelos Gov. Cuauhtémoc Blanco has long cut a controversial course through Mexican soccer and politics. The temperamental striker and bad teammate won legions of fans for humble origins on the tough streets of Tepito – a rough Mexico City neighbourhood notorious for contraband. His soccer exploits, meanwhile, included a move known at the cuauhtemiña, in which he would bamboozle opponents by putting the ball between his feet and hopping over defenders.
His fame led him to politics as he won the mayoral election in Cuernavaca (capital of Morelos and just south of Mexico City) with 28% of the vote in 2015 for a minor party known as PES (which was founded by Evangelicals, but has twice failed to keep its registration by failing to pass the 3% vote threshold in 2018 and 2021.)
He accomplished little as mayor and even tried to make himself an absentee figure. His main calling card was scuttling of an attempt at establishing a unified police in Morelos to be known as mando unico (single command), which he opposed by simply asserting it was supposedly unpopular.
“Cuauh” subsequently ran for governor as an ally of AMLO’s MORENA party in 2018, leaning on his celebrity and riding AMLO’s coattails in a state rife with narco activities and rough rural regions where memories of revolutionary general Emiliano Zapata remain strong – and crimes like kidnapping and extortion are rife. His name even surfaces in idle chatter over possible presidential successors – such is his name recognition and appeal among the popular classes.
Controversial photo
But allegations of narco collusion quickly surfaced. Newspaper El Sol de México published photos Blanco appeared in a January 2022 photo with his arms around three alleged cartel bosses. The alleged leaders included the regional leader of the Jalisco New Generation Cartel (CJNG), “El Ray,” who was subsequently killed in a prison riot; a leader known as “El Profe” from Guerreros Unidos – a group disputing heroin and fentanyl production and distribution in Guerrero state to the south and is implicated in the attack on the 43 Ayotzinapa teacher trainees – who became CJNG boss in Morelos, but was detained in 2021; and “La Tripa,” leader of a local criminal organization known as Comando Tlahuica (or Los Tlahuicas.) It’s believe Los Tlahuicas are splinter group from the Beltrán Leyva Cartel – whose leader Arturo Beltrán Leyva, ‘Jefe de Jefes,’ was killed in a 2009 navy raid in Cuernavaca.
Blanco claimed the to have not known the men and justified the photo by claiming lots of people ask for pictures with him. El Sol de México reported the photo was found on the smartphone of an arrested Guerreros Unidos leader.
Alleged agreements
According to a leaked army intelligence report dated May 14, 2019, and obtained by the newspaper El Universal, Blanco allegedly “established agreements” with El Ray. El Universal wrote:
“The agreement, according to the document, consisted of El Ray being able to operate with ‘absolute impunity’ in Morelos in exchange for supporting Blanco ‘in his proselytizing campaign’ and not ‘heating up the plaza (territory).’”
A naval intelligence document found in the leaks and published by Aristegui Noticias described Morelos as constantly being disputed by drug cartels due to its strategic importance between Mexico City and Guerrero state (site of Acapulco) to the south.
“(It’s) a junction point on the drug route from the state of Guerrero and its entry into the states of Mexico and Mexico City.”
The navy document also alleged cartel collusion involving a pair of cabinet members – including Blanco’s government secretary, the No. 2 position in his administration – a federal senator, 18 mayors, two members of the state legislature and the state prosecutor.
News organization Animal Politico cited military intelligence, alleging that Blanco, when mayor of Cuernavaca – with a metro population of 1.1 million – turned over administration of the local waterworks to Comando Tlahuica.
AMLO defends Blanco, attacks media
AMLO, per his usual style, doggedly defended Blanco, while blasting the newsweekly Proceso for making the governor’s alleged narco ties its cover story. He accused Proceso – which AMLO eroneously considered an ally while in opposition – of “taking sides against Cuauhtémoc Blanco,” while failing to address the accusations in the leaked military documents.
For his part, Blanco denied the accusations and said: “Let them investigate me.”
Other governors named in #SedenaLeaks
#SedenaLeaks – also known as #GuacamayaLeaks – involves a hacker-activist group known as Guacamaya hacking the National Defence Secretariat (SEDENA) and gaining access to its email servers. Along with the governor of Morelos, the leaks of implicated the governors of Tabasco, Veracruz and San Luis Potosí – with the last on the list being accused of reaching agreements with the CJNG, which fell apart. (All of the governors involved deny the accusations.)
The accusations followed the CJNG rolling into Mexiquitic in San Luis Potosí state (six-hours drive south of Monterrey) in a show of force.
FUEL THEFT PRODUCES BIG PROFITS
Powerful criminal groups have seized upon fuel theft in recent years – the tapping of Pemex pipelines and fencing of stolen gasoline – in an act known as “huachicoleo”. Fights of fuel theft have turned states in to battlegrounds – such as Guanajuato, in west-central Mexico, the country’s conservative-Catholic heartland, where multiple automakers operate factories and a Pemex has a massive refinery. A local criminal group known as the Santa Rosa de Lima Cartel has also been fending off incursions from the CJNG into Guanajuato and its fuel-theft racket.
In a report obtained by Mileno from the hacked SEDENA emails, the military estimates the Santa Rosa de Lima Cartel earned 1.8 million pesos daily (roughly US $90,000) in 2020 from siphoning fuel from Pemex pipelines.
The report also described the Santa Rosa de Lima Cartel selling stolen gasoline for just nine pesos per litre (US $1.73 per gallon) – a 59 percent discount from the prices at the pump. Fuel was sold through tire repair shops, but also to fleet operators, including all three levels of government, according to Milenio.
Tapping a Pemex pipeline full of combustibles requires precision, causing investigators to suspect collusion with Pemex employees – through coercion or corruption. In March 2021, Guanajuato state prosecutor Carlos Zamarripa told the state legislature that Pemex offered little cooperation in combatting huachicoleo – something AMLO tried cracking down on after taking office, provoking fuel shortages across the country and long lines at service stations.
Zamarripa estimated 80% of the fuel thefts occurred inside the Pemex refinery in the city of Salamanca, according to news organization Zona Franca. A federal report put the number of clandestine pipeline connections in Guanajuato at more than 500.
Fuel for drugs
In its story on the leaked military report on huachicoleo, Milenio cited a security expert, who described the Santa Rosa de Lima Cartel trading stolen fuel for methamphetamines produced by a criminal group in neighbouring Michaocán state known as Los Viagras. The meth, however, is blue in colour, the expert said, to compete with the meth distributed by the CJNG.
Murder capital of Mexico for police officers
Policing in Guanajuato can prove lethal as the state routinely leads the country in the number of murdered police officers. Anti-crime group Causa en Común counted 46 officers murdered in Guanajuato in 2022 – trailing only Zacatecas, where five municipal police officers and a commander were murdered Sept. 28 by an armed group while working out at sports complex. Guanajuato recorded 54 police officer murders in 2021, 84 police officer murders in 2020 and 73 police officers murders in 2019.
The city of Celaya, just south of the chichi colonial city of San Miguel de Allende – long popular with winter Texans – has been hit especially hard by the violence gripping Guanajuato. The grim situation is captured well in the New York Times story below.
FEWER NARCO-LAB BUSTS UNDER AMLO
Mexico has dismantled 75% fewer narco-laboratories used to cook up methamphetamines, fentanyl and other drugs over the first three years of the López Obrador administration, when compared to the same period under his predecessor Enrique Peña Nieto.
According to a public records request by the newspaper El Universal, Mexican authorities dismantled 100 narco-laboratories between 2019 and 2021, compared with 401 narco-laboratories between 2013 and 2015. Most of the dismantled narco-laboratories were in the state of Sinaloa – 44 – followed by Jalisco and Durango.
Analysts consulted by El Universal cited the president’s strategy of “hugs, not bullets” for the decline in clandestine lab busts, along with suspicions of a government preference for Sinaloa Cartel – which produces drugs like methamphetamines and fentanyl in its home state.
TREASURY SANCTIONS CARTEL FOR ‘RAINBOW FENTANYL’
The U.S. Department of the Treasury sanctioned La Nueva Familia Michoacana and its two co-leaders for trafficking “rainbow fentanyl” and other drugs to the United States. Treasury said in a Nov. 17 statement:
“La Nueva Familia Michoacana operates in approximately 35 Mexican municipalities in the states of Michoacán, Guerrero, Morelos, and the state of Mexico. It is expanding into other regions of Mexico and generates revenue from drug trafficking, illicit mining, and extortion. Members of La Nueva Familia Michoacana are distributing “rainbow fentanyl,” which is spreading throughout the United States.”
Treasury previously sanctioned La Familia Michoacana in 2009, when it dominated the Tierra Caliente region of Michoacán state – where it cooked up methamphetamines, smuggled chemical precursors through the port of Lázaro Cárdenas and took a cut of every ton of iron-ore from local mines being sent to Asian markets. It also ran such extensive extortion rackets, which skimmed money off everything limes to the fees for using public toilets. Self-defence groups grabbed guns to run them off in 2013 – though many of those grabbing guns had unclean hands.
A rump group with the La Familia Michoacana name now operates extensively in a mostly rural region of Mexico state – which surrounds Mexico City on three sides – near the border of Guerrero state. A source from the region says it operates extortion rackets, while an operative from the ruling MORENA party said security was so lacking that campaigning could not be carried out in the region prior to the 2021 midterms.
Involvement in massacre?
In late October, public security undersecretary Ricardo Mejía Berdeja said El Pez and El Fresa were being investigated for a massacre earlier that month in the Guerrero municipality San Miguel Totolapa, which claimed 20 lives – including the mayor. Mejía Berdeja said the men were suspects, who “tried to also simulate that it had to do with another criminal group.”
AMLO CELEBRATES 1000 MORNING SECURITY CABINET MEETINGS
AMLO puts a heavy emphasis on appearances and intentions – selling the idea that his administration is well-meaning and honest, which makes criticism of it somehow illegitimate, failures easy to explain away and calamities the domain of opportunistic “opponents” wanting to undermine his movement.
Among the appearances: holding a daily security cabinet meeting at 6 a.m. just prior to his morning press conference (which lasts another two hours – minimum.) The security cabinet – which includes the president, interior secretary, public security secretary, defence secretary and navy secretary (among others) met for the 1,000th occasion on Wednesday in Manzanillo – and promoted the occasion with photos of a custom cake to celebrate.
Federal government spokesman Jesús Ramírez Cueves tweeted the previous day of crimes plummeting in 2022. He claimed federal crimes – drugs, guns, organized crime – dropped 67% over the first 10 months of the year. Homicide fell 22% when compared to 2018, according to Ramírez Cuevas, while kidnappings were 68.1% fewer and femicides fell by 22%.
AIRPORT THEFT CAUSES CHAOS
The Mexico City International Airport has slid into an increasingly dilapidated state with crumbling infrastructure and frequent delays – to say nothing of the air-traffic control issues and the FAA downgrading Mexican aviation to Category 2. The Navy has assumed control of the airport – both operations and security. But systems in the immigration area of Terminal 2 crashed Wednesday, causing longer than usual lines, as thieves cut fiberoptic cables, looking for copper. The interior ministry says agents worked manually during the outage, which was fixed within hours.
AMLO MOBILIZES ‘EL PUEBLO’
An estimated quarter million Mexicans marched Nov. 13 in Mexico City in support of the National Electoral Institute (INE), which organizes elections and referees partisan political activity. It’s predecessor, the Federal Electoral Institute (IFE), midwifed the country’s transition from one-party rule to multi-party democracy and oversaw the unthinkable: the Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI) peacefully losing power in 2000 after 71-years office.
AMLO has mocked the march since its announcement, dedicating much of his morning press conference to questioning the democratic credentials of people participating in the march, calling them names and inferring criminal behaviour. “There was a lot of pickpocketing,” AMLO said 10 days after the march.
True to his populist form, AMLO beckoned his own followers to march in a show of force through central Mexico City on Nov 27. The march revives his long-time tradition of protest – a form of self-legitimization in the face of opposition. But observers see a spooked president, who was likely stunned by the mass-turnout of (mostly middle-class) Mexicans repudiating his administration in the place he long has laid claim to: the street. As one former worker in the Democratic Revolution Party (PRD), which he once led and twice fronted as its presidential candidate:
“They thought they had a monopoly on the street.”
Electoral ‘reform’ advances in congress
The president’s electoral reform (discussed in the previous newsletter) is expected to be voted on in the lower house of congress next week. But AMLO lacks the votes to achieve a constitutional reform, which would critics contend would put the autonomous electoral institute under the presidential control – not unlike the days of PRI rule, which AMLO’s appears intent on dragging the country back to.
AMLO has said he will introduce a “Plan B” should his original reform fail – a distinct possibility as the opposition parties have announced they will vote against it, denying the two-thirds majority required. The Plan B would “tighten” the INE budget – which is high, in part, according to observers, because of the legacy of one-party rule, whose effects lingered long after the PRI losing in 2000.
AMLO has insisted the march is to show support for his so-called “fourth transformation” – as he’s branded his government – rather than his proposed electoral reform. Manuel Díaz, writing for the website sdpnoticias, outlined the contrasts between the marches:
“No caudillo was cheered at the march last Sunday. We citizens came to defend a cause: democracy. We are not going out to support the messianic egocentrism of a character who tries to show that there is no one more popular than him, that no one can beckon more people on the street than him, that no one can be more loved than him.
HAPPY THANKSGIVING! – FROM MEXICO
Did conquistador Hernán Cortés and Aztec emperor Moctezuma celebrate the first Thanksgiving? Perhaps not, but Cortés was apparently the first European to try turkey, which has its origins in Mexico and is still consumed regionally. It’s also becoming a Christmas staple and desired for Thanksgiving dinners – an American import taking hold with moneyed set.
Mexico City-based journalist Nathaniel Parish Flannery explores the Mexican origins of turkey for Forbes magazine:
“In the early 1500s, Spanish conquistador Hernan Cortes was one of the first Europeans to see the turkey in Aztec emperor Moctezuma’s palace. Moctezuma gave Cortes and his men a gift of over one thousand turkeys. To the Spanish, the turkey looked like a majestic peacock, but with plainer colors. They called it the pavo, a reference to the pavo real, the Spanish word for peacock. …
“If there’s one key takeaway people should understand, it’s that most turkeys consumed in the U.S. on Thanksgiving do trace back some of their roots to guajolotes from Mexico.”