US Protects Groups It Labels Terrorists: Sheinbaum

ByNéstor Jiménez

This article by Néstor Jiménez originally appeared in the July 7, 2026 edition of La Jornada, Mexico’s premier left wing daily newspaper.

Mexico City. President Claudia Sheinbaum Pardo maintained that the United States (US) embassy presented information to the Mexican government about the 2024 arrest of Ismael “El Mayo” Zambada, co-founder of the Sinaloa Cartel, that “has nothing to do with what actually allegedly happened.” This came after the information released last week about an alleged participation of the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) in that case.

In suggesting that the US agency acted in that arrest, according to a report by a California newspaper, the president questioned that country’s government over the “protection” of that criminal group, which it at the same time labels “terrorist,” and demanded that the facts be clarified.

“Who lied?” Sheinbaum Pardo asked, stressing that security collaboration “cannot justify invasion or interference.” Although this is a drug trafficker whom “no one is going to defend,” she emphasized that it is necessary to safeguard “sovereignty and to put interference and even intervention in their proper place.”

Detained in the United States, Zambada has claimed that he was forced onto a plane in Culiacán and taken to El Paso, Texas, where US authorities were already waiting for him. On the same aircraft traveled Joaquín Guzmán López, son of Joaquín “El Chapo” Guzmán, who was also arrested.

It was last week that it came to light that the FBI donated that plane to the War Eagles Air Museum in New Mexico, where it is displayed as an example of the “coordinated law enforcement efforts” to capture criminals.

After announcing that today she will present all the information the Mexican government has on this case, she indicated that “there was, according to this report and to the work we have been doing since” the text came out, “a way in which the United States acted or some of its agencies acted.”

The president stated that it “has to be clarified, for the good of Mexico and of the bilateral relationship,” and, given the relevance of the situation, “first, because of what was published; because of the display of this plane in an exhibit in which the FBI directly participates, and because of what was said at the time, formally, to the Mexican government.”

During her morning press conference yesterday, she detailed that “what the US ambassador said then, through letters,” Ken Salazar, will be presented, even though the diplomat from former President Joe Biden’s government assured, in August 2024, that “there were no US resources in that operation, it was not a US plane, it was not a US pilot, they were not our agents in Mexico,” and argued that “El Mayo” Zambada could have been handed over by a rival group.

President Sheinbaum Pardo announced that the Attorney General’s Office (FGR) will present the information its head, Alejandro Gertz Manero, received from the neighboring country’s embassy, which shows “what is acknowledged today and how things happened. And even, against this criminal group, how it was protected for a time and how this internal dispute was generated, because it has an impact not only in Sinaloa.”

In defining the matter as one of national relevance and of importance for the relationship between the two countries, she stated that “the fight, the work, and the enforcement of the law against organized crime cannot justify, under any circumstances, interference or subordination. We collaborate because we do not interfere over there, because we are equal countries, nations that see each other as equals; but one thing is one thing and interference, even intervention, is another.”

She emphasized that it “cannot justify invasion,” which is why she called it important that all available information come to light.