El Yunque Founder José Antonio Quintana Croaks in Puebla; Far Right Mourns

ByÁlvaro Delgado Gómez

This article by Álvaro Delgado Gómez originally appeared in the December 19, 2025 edition of Sin Embargo.

Mexico City. José Antonio Quintana Fernández , one of the founders and second-in-command of the secret organization El Yunque, died this Thursday in Puebla, triggering consternation in political, business, and academic circles in Mexico and around the world where this far-right sect has a presence and influence, such as in the team of the President-elect of Chile, José Antonio Kast, and the Vox party in Spain.

The Popular Autonomous University of the State of Puebla (UPAEP) , the educational institution founded by El Yunque in 1973, officially announced the death of Quintana Fernández , who assumed the general leadership of the secret organization after the shooting death of its top leader, Ramón Plata Moreno, on December 24, 1979, a crime attributed to the also extremist Tecos of the Autonomous University of Guadalajara (UAG) , from which it originated and later broke away.

“UPAEP mourns the passing of José Antonio Quintana Fernández, its pillar and founder,” the institution announced last night. Rector Emilio Baños Ardavín wrote: “Rest in peace, dear Toño. Your legacy, testimony, and great human qualities are a source of inspiration and commitment to train leaders who will transform society.”

Quintana Fernández was part of the founding group of El Yunque in Puebla, in 1953, an extension of the Tecos of the UAG, as part of a project against the left and liberalism, of an anti-Semitic nature and defender of the Catholic Church, which had the impetus of the Jesuit priest Manuel Figueroa and with the support of Bishop Octaviano Márquez y Toris.

Although El Yunque still maintains the idea that there is a “Judeo-Masonic-Communist conspiracy” against Western civilization, it broke with the Tecos of the UAG in 1966 because they accused the Pope of being Jewish, Freemason and “crypto-communist”, a Cold War language that these organizations have not yet managed to rid themselves of.

The rivalry between El Yunque and Los Tecos reached its climax on December 25, 1979, when Plata Moreno, the founder and leader of the former organization, was assassinated while celebrating Christmas Eve at his in-laws’ house in the Lindavista neighborhood of Mexico City. The leader had recently returned from exile in the United States, following an attempt on his life in 1975, which came after the murder that same year of two of his members at Cerro del Cubilete in Guanajuato.

El Yunque, as a secret organization, maintained a close relationship with the Federal Security Directorate, the political police of the PRI regime, and with the United States Central Intelligence Agency, the CIA, as documented in the book Derecha, by Alejandro Páez and this reporter, and was financed among other businessmen by Hugo Salinas Price, father of Ricardo Salinas Pliego, the magnate who wants to be President of Mexico.

Upon Plata Moreno’s death, Quintana Fernández, who until his death was known as “Leonardo”, assumed the general leadership of the organization and promoted its national and international expansion, especially to Spain, South America and the United States, where it has numerous militant members.

Spain is one of the countries where El Yunque has the most influence, whose founder and general leader is the Mexican Miguel Ángel López Zavaleta, since he managed to penetrate the Popular Party and Vox and Fundar, and control organizations such as HazteOir and CitizenGo.

The son of López Zavaleta, a close friend of Quintana Fernández, is in the middle of a Vox corruption scandal: Jaime López Lozano, son of the leader of El Yunque, is involved in the theft of money that “Revuelta”, the youth organization of Vox, raised for the victims of the “Dana” in Spain.

El Yunque also expanded into South America, including Chile, thanks to the links it established with the extreme right in several countries, including Chile, whose President-elect, José Antonio Kast, has members of the organization born in Mexico in his circle.

Eduardo Guerrero Núñez

Eduardo Guerrero Núñez, the head of El Yunque in Chile, coordinated Kast’s economic program during his first campaign until he was accused of fraud. But there are other members of this sect in the inner circle of Chile’s president-elect.

In Mexico, El Yunque continues to have a significant influence on the National Action Party (PAN) with former presidents who are members, such as Luis Felipe Bravo Mena, Manuel Espino, César Nava and Cecilia Romero, and the motto “Fatherland, family and freedom” alludes to “God, Fatherland, Yunque” of this organization that had a great influence on the governments of Vicente Fox and Felipe Calderón.

El Yunque has also had a significant influence in employers’ organizations, especially in the Mexican Employers’ Confederation (COPARMEX), with former presidents such as Bernardo Ardavín Migoni —former chief general—, Jorge Ocejo Moreno, Carlos Abascal, Antonio Sánchez Díaz de Rivera and Gerardo Aranda Orozco.

The deceased Quintana Fernández was succeeded as head of El Yunque by Guillermo Velasco Arzac, advisor to the magnate Claudio X. González Guajardo in the PRIAN coalition, and by Ardavín Migoni, nephew of the rector of UPAEP.

Álvaro Delgado Gómez is an author and journalist, who began his career in 1986 as a reporter and has worked for El Financiero, El Nacional, El Universal, and Proceso.

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