Tensions are rising between the United States and Mexico…
On Thursday, Mexican President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador threatened to commence an “information campaign” against Republicans after some lawmakers proposed harsher measures to crack down on cartels smuggling fentanyl into the country.
Fentanyl is 50 to 100 times more fatal than morphine…
“Starting today we are going to start an information campaign for Mexicans who live and work in the United States and for all Hispanics to inform them of what we are doing in Mexico and how this initiative by the Republicans, in addition to being irresponsible, is an offense against the people of Mexico, a lack of respect for our independence, our sovereignty,” President Obrador said.
🇲🇽 Mexico President López Obrador threatens the Republican Party with ordering all Mexicans living in the US to vote against them if they insist on declaring war on drug traffickers and classifying them as terrorists. pic.twitter.com/p8NX733xo5— DaveO ⚔️ 🗽 (@Patri0tCx_) March 10, 2023
“And if they do not change their attitude and think that they are going to use Mexico for their propaganda, electoral, and political purposes, we are going to call for them not to vote for that party, because it is interventionist, inhumane, hypocritical, and corrupt,” Lopez Obrador said, later adding that Mexico would be insisting that “not one vote” goes to Republicans from Mexicans and Hispanics.
The President of Mexico was responding to recent calls for action from Republican lawmakers, including military action, to crack down on the ongoing smuggling crisis.
Earlier this week, Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) said that he intends to introduce legislation that would designate Mexican drug cartels as foreign terrorist organizations (FTOs) and authorize the U.S. to use military force to go into Mexico and destroy the drug networks.
It is now time to change the game on how we deal with Mexican drug cartels.— Lindsey Graham (@LindseyGrahamSC) March 9, 2023
“We’re going to unleash the fury and might of the United States against these cartels,” Graham said. “We’re going to destroy their business model and their lifestyle because our national security and the security of the United States as a whole depends on us taking decisive action.”
“Not to invade Mexico, not to shoot Mexican airplanes down, but to destroy drug labs that are poisoning Americans,” he said according to Fox News.
Former President Trump’s national security adviser John Bolton on Friday argued against labeling Mexican drug cartels foreign terrorist organizations
“I don’t underestimate their threat. I’ve been talking about it for a long time. We were very worried about it in the Trump administration. The cartels in Mexico, the cartels in Colombia have been growing in strength,” Bolton said on NewsNation’s “Morning in America.”
“But I think it fuzzes things up to label something as bad as the drug cartels a terrorist organization,” Bolton continued. “They’re not like Hamas or Hezbollah. It’s a different threat; it’s a serious problem. As I say, I’m not underestimating it at all, but I think rhetorical gimmicks don’t help advance policy.”
The DEA said in December that “most of the fentanyl trafficked by the Sinaloa and CJNG Cartels is being mass-produced at secret factories in Mexico with chemicals sourced largely from China.”
Members of a Mexican cartel kidnapped four Americans who traveled across the border from Brownsville, Texas, to Matamoros, Tamaulipas, last week. Two of the Americans and an innocent Mexican bystander died during the incident involving the Gulf Cartel, according to U.S. Ambassador to Mexico Ken Salazar.