The Connect- with Johnny Mitchell - Can He Stop Them? Inside Trumps War On Mexican Drug Cartels & The New Era Of Mexican Criminal Groups

Episode Date: February 9, 2025

2024 has seen record-breaking cartel violence in Mexico, with brutal conflicts erupting across the country. With Donald Trump back in office, he's vowing to crush the cartels, declaring them terrorist organizations and even threatening military intervention in Mexico. But is this plan realistic? In this deep dive, we explore: 🔹 The collapse of the old cartel system and rise of decentralized criminal groups 🔹 How cartels have diversified beyond drugs into oil theft, human smuggling, and extortion 🔹 The massive government crackdown on cartel leaders, including the arrest of El Mayo 🔹 Why Mexico is modernizing and pushing cartels out to become a global manufacturing hub 🔹 The impact of Trump’s immigration policies on cartel profits 🔹 The fentanyl epidemic, independent drug cooks, and why stopping trafficking is almost impossible Will Trump’s war on cartels work, or is this just another chapter in the never-ending battle? This Episode Is #Sponsored By The Following: BetterHelp! Give online therapy a try at https://betterhelp.com/connect and get on your way to being your best self. Rocket Money! Cancel your unwanted subscriptions and reach your financial goals faster with Rocket Money. Go to https://rocketmoney.com/connect today. Join The Patreon For Bonus Content! https://www.patreon.com/theconnectshow Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Mexico has reached a pinnacle of cartel violence, with another record-breaking year of homicides in 2024. The war in Kuliacan between the remnants of the Sinaloa organization is entering its fourth month, with over a thousand deaths and disappearances and no end in sight. Not even American tourists and civilians are safe this time. And of course, the fentanyl continues to ship north unabated. But now that Donald Trump is president again, he's threatening to reign hell on these cartels. In fact, as of this recording, he just passed an executive order declaring them terrorist organizations. And he's threatening Mexico not only with economic sanctions,

he actually wants to send military forces into northern Mexico to decapitate the command of these organizations. But is this realistic? To me, it flies in the face of everything I've learned about the nature of Mexican criminal groups and the way the narcotics business has evolved since the era of the supercartails and the mythic drug lords who headed them. Let's have a look. And before we get started, if you could be a mensch and leave a like and a comment on this video and subscribe to the channel if you have not already, I would greatly appreciate it. 2024 was the craziest year since the Mexican War on Drugs was declared back in 2006. Cartel leaders and their kids were getting knocked off in spades and extradited to the U.S.,

including two of Chappo's sons, El Meno's brother and son-in-law, and scores of other lieutenants and plaza bosses from Juarez to Halisco. The arrest that made the most headlines, of course, was back in July of 24 when Ismail Miles Abada, with the help of the Chapitos and almost dead. definitely the American CIA, was kidnapped from a ranch in Sonora and flown on a private jet to awaiting DEA agents in Texas. This is what kicked off the civil war that's now raging in Sina Loa. But more on that in a second. The heat is coming down hard on cartels and criminal gangs all over Mexico.

It's so hot that I can't even get one of these organizations to let me film with them right now, even when I offer them good money. All you hear from guys in the front line is, puro caliente, for all Mexico, is very caliente. Everyone is bunkered down waiting for the bullets to stop flying. The question is why? Why this crackdown and why now? Why did the Mexican government all of a sudden take an interest in crime fighting? Have they actually become less corrupt?

Yes and no. I do think on some level the violence has gotten so out of control in Mexico that the social contract that has long been held between ordinary citizens and the cartels who rule over their territory is starting to break down. And civilians are increasingly demanding that law enforcement intervene on their behalf to stop cartel crime. That's a complete paradigm shift in Mexican culture, by the way. For literally the last 200 years, the government and the police were viewed as the enemies of the people, and the outlaws and the bandits were seen as the good guys, the Robin Hoods who protected

the civilians, doled out charity, and provided employment. Now, don't get me wrong, Mexican criminal organizations still employ a shitload of people. According to a 2023 study, Mexican organized crime has about 175,000 people working for it, which makes it the fifth largest employer in the country. However, these jobs don't have a lot of job security, obviously, and the benefits are even worse. Check out this clip from a past podcast we did with our friend, Ali Gonzalez, who told us what cartel Sicarios,

who fight and die to protect drug shipments, earn on a monthly basis. How much were they paying you at the time? Bro, you don't even want to know. Yeah, I do, but it's going to hurt. They're going to hurt a lot. a month kincenales every 15 days okay so they're paying you 7,000 pesos a month

3,500 yeah 7,000 pesos a month which is comes to how many dollars it's like probably like 400 500 dollars I think so that's probably that's just more that's probably just more than what you can make in the fields right

in that moment it was more than what you can make obviously right now the a month everybody's making a month everybody's making above 14,000. But in that time, yeah, obviously they adjust for inflation. But yeah, they have to pay you a little more or else people wouldn't do it. People won't do it. Because the minimal

minimum wage, I think, is like $7. In 2020, they told me it was $7 a day. So it's a little more than that, but it's not great money. That sucks. It makes you wonder why anyone would choose to sign up in the first place. But there's still enough desperate poverty in rural Mexico that becoming a

cartel soldier remains a better option. than working in the fields. Side note, there is now some evidence of forced recruitment by Mexican criminal organizations, especially in the southern state of Chiapas on the Mexico-G Guatemala border. Cartels have started to kidnap Central American migrants and force them to fight or to assist in their various rackets, especially human smuggling. But that aside, the point is not really how many people work for cartels. The real question is, what exactly is a cartel anymore?

Well, we know now after doing this show and talking to many people involved, directly with these organizations, Mexican cartels are just armed paramilitary groups who make money by protecting drug shipments on behalf of drug traffickers. These armed organizations earn money by first taxing the local drug traffic in the territories they control. And then when it comes to the large drug shipments that get set north to the border to be smuggled into America, they use violence and intimidation to force state politicians and law enforcement into allowing and assisting with this smuggling. There are many members of Mexican cartels who never see or sell the drugs that they're protecting, just like there are many Mexican drug traffickers who never touch a gun, pay off a politician, or kill a rival. In the old days, up until about 10 years ago when Chappo went down for good,

most cartels kept both sides of their organization, the military branch and the drug trafficking branch, in-house under one umbrella, very much like the hierarchy of a mafia or a large company. But with the heat from the United States and Mexico coming down on them harder and hard, every year, these hierarchies have now become almost completely decentralized. That 175,000 cartel employees that I told you about, that number is split between an estimated 198 armed criminal groups who operate throughout Mexico. You see, there's this big myth that the Sina Loa cartel and the Nuevo Halisco cartel have some kind of omnipotent dominion over this gigantic-ass country that is Mexico, and they have this,

you know, monopoly on all the underworld activities. but nothing could be further from the truth, especially not these days. Basically, the way it works is these local armed groups make alliances with the legacy cartels like Sinaloa and C.J.N.J., who grant them the rights to use their name and their brand while they conduct their criminal activities in exchange for a cut of the profits. It's almost like a franchise. Aside from that, though, these smaller provincial groups operate freely in all kinds of different criminal rackets, not just drug trafficking.

Far from it, actually. They're heavily involved in everything from oil theft from the state, run oil pipelines to local extortion of businesses, bid rigging of government contracts, car theft on a massive scale, and of course human smuggling, which over the last four years is competing to overtake drug smuggling as the most profitable criminal enterprise in Mexico. Year after year, the criminal economy is becoming more and more decentralized, just like the illegitimate economy in Mexico and the rest of the world. It's come to a point now where Mexican organized crime is now barely organized. And this creates violence and a lot of it, as is proof with the

hot zones driving up the murder rates and states all over Mexico. Now, back to my original point about why the government is cracking down so hard on cartels. Well, if you know anything about the history of crime and politics in Mexico, you know that the most dominant cartels dealt directly with whichever political party was in power at the time, meaning they paid bribes at the federal level all the way up to the president of Mexico. It's unbelievable. Just let that sink in. You can go do your own research, but literally every single Mexican president since 2006 when the war on drugs was declared, including high-ranking generals in the military, as well as the Secretary of State, have been accused by captured drug lords of taking bribes from them worth

hundreds of millions of dollars. They are the ones, the politicians in the military, who really run drug trafficking and crime in Mexico. They allow it, in exchange. for hefty fees from whichever organization they believe can be the dominant player. The idea was that this union between the federal government and the leading cartels would help keep a lid on violence and chaos throughout the rest of the country. Remember, everything in Mexico is about appearances. You pay us and feed us some of your competitors from time to time, and you could continue to make money and in turn pay us even more bribes.

That was the mindset. And for almost two decades, the cartel with the privilege of paying the man in Mexico City was, of course, Cartel de Sinaloa. From Arturo Beltran Leiva to Chapo Guzman and finally, Ismail Mayo Zambada, each Sinaloan kingpin paid off the people at the top and then turned around and ratted

each other out. Just remember that. All of the kingpins eventually rat. It is just the way business is conducted. In hindsight though, it was an unsustainable business model and the reason that they're at war in Kulia Khan today. The point is, there was a structure, a method, a clearly defined mechanism for maintaining order

and making sure the wheels of corruption ran smoothly. The money flowed into Mexico City and the drugs flowed north, into America. But today, that entire system is basically collapsed. There is no more mega cartel with the kind of money, resources, and political connections necessary to make a deal with the federal government. That all ended with the arrest and extradition of Old Man Mayo last July. One of the reasons Mayo Zimbada lasted so long, over five decades as the most wanted drug kingpin in history, is because of his entrenched connections and deal-making with the federal government in Mexico and, of course, probably the CIA and the DEA as well. He was diversified

in cocaine, heroin, and methamphetamine, so he had a huge war chest to pay off politicians, and he was, of course, an informant, just like the rest of the cartel bosses. He turned in his rivals and his partners alike, especially when he felt like the heat was coming down on him or his organization. But now in Sinaloa, the last of the legacy cartels is in tatters, and the remnants of the Mayo and Chapo clans are engaged in a war to the death. The problem, the problem The problem with all of this, aside from the obvious devastation on the civilian population, is, who's paying the government? Americans don't stop wanting their drugs, and politicians in Mexico don't stop wanting their

taste of the drug money, just because some farmers in Kulia Khan are killing each other. But guess what? You can't get blood out of a turn-up. Despite the headlines that glorify how fabulously wealthy the so-called Mexican cartels are, the reality is these super-cartels have splintered into hundreds of disparate criminal clans who operate fully underground, largely without. the blessings of the population or the government in their pockets. In other words, the majority of them have no meaningful political or social influence.

They are criminals and behave and are treated much how they would be in the United States or other relatively law-abiding countries. Now, don't get me wrong, some of these groups are still doing well. For instance, the fentanyl boom has created a lot of young millionaires in Sinaloa and Sonora, but it ain't like it used to be. Many of these organizations are overextended from going to war with each other and the government. Plus now, marijuana is legal in the United States, which has been a massive hit to the large cartels, and the price of cocaine remains relatively low compared to Europe and Asia,

which are by far the most lucrative Coke markets. This is part of the reason that Mexican criminal groups have diversified into all of these other different, non-drug-related, illicit activities. The drug money has slowed up. I was fascinated to learn that a lot of these smaller groups actually make the majority of their money from criminal rackets exclusively within Mexico. You see, in America, we're led to. to believe that every Mexican organized crime group is engaged in a constant assault on our country

with drugs and migrants, when in reality, many of these clans, especially the ones not located on the border, make their money by terrorizing and plundering their own country. But again, all of these factors, not having a hierarchy or control at the top, decentralization, and diversification of illicit businesses makes for even crazier and out-of-control violence. And this forces the government to crack down, even if they might be reluctant to do it. I'm sure many dirty politicians and military leaders in Mexico also long for the good old days when they were raking in the drug money. And that's part of the reason it's so critical that a clear victor emerged from the war in Sinaloa. They need to be clear on who they're supposed to be dealing

with. Which group? The Chapitos or the Maitos will be paying the piper. They want shit to get back to normal, whatever normal looks like in 2025. That's why in the streets of Kulia Khan, the military and the federales are standing by idly, like referees in a soccer match, waiting for one team to finally finish off the other. So that was a fancy way of telling you that the money or the lack of it is one of the reasons for the Mexican government's recent assault on cartels. Secondly, Mexico is trying to modernize. They want to become the new manufacturing hub of the Western Hemisphere. They want to be the new China. It's a term political scientists call nearshoring. So instead of American companies having all of their goods made in China or Southeast Asia, what's known as offshoring, they would

nearshore those jobs and products to Mexico. There's also a plan to build a high-tech railway system for cargo to cut through the body of central southern Mexico, called the interoceanic corridor of the isthmus of Teuatapak. It would connect the Pacific Ocean to the Gulf of Mexico and overtake the Panama Canal as the main route for cargo ships coming to the Americas from overseas. That would be a game changer for Mexico and pour billions of dollars into the economy every year.

But they can't do this if they're on the news every night for being a lawless narco state. They need to clean up their image. Remember, in Mexico, it's all about appearances. But one of the main reason, reasons, probably the reason for Mexico's new aggressive policy towards crime and cartels, is, of course, Big Daddy, the United States. Donald Trump is back in the motherfucking White House.

Absolutely wild. I think the Mexican feds knew what was going to happen back in 2023 and early 24, and they thought it would be wise to get a jump on the cartel hunting in case Trump really does decide to lay the hammer down when he takes office. Here's Trump a few nights after he got elected, laying out his plan for dealing with the cartels. Spring weekends are all about family, sunshine, and evenings on the patio. Before everyone arrives, I stop by my local Total Wine and More to grab a great bottle to share. With such a wide selection and the lowest prices, it's easy to find something amazing for everyone to enjoy.

If you're not sure what to pick, their friendly guides can help. Find what you love and love what you find only at Total Wine and More. Shop total wine and more in store or online. Spirits not sold in Virginia and North Carolina. Drink responsibly. B-21. So they are now designated as terrorist organizations foreign. And Mexico probably doesn't want that.

He's threatening huge tariffs, and if that doesn't work, he's promising to send American special forces into Northern Mexico to hunt down and kill the fentanyl cooks and top brass. of the Sinaloa organization and beyond. That would be fucking insane, and it would amount to a small-scale invasion of a sovereign nation and our neighbor. But let's be objective,

we know Donald Trump likes to bark. We expect that from him. It's strong man intimidation, pure and simple. He's threatening tariffs and military force with a lot of other countries now, most of which aren't going to happen. In the case of Mexico, the U.S. hasn't had any diplomatic relations with them

in a long time. The new president, Gloria Shinebomb, is from the same leftist political party of Manuel Obrador, who was president, for the last eight years and who has close ties to the Sina Loa organization. Their party is pursuing very nationalistic, Mexico-first policies, and don't want interference from Gringos.

That's why it's so wild that they've been on this extradition binge of captured cartel leaders right now. It makes me think they really are afraid of what Trump might do. Because after all, there really isn't shit that they can do if we actually decide to send teams of SEAL Team 6 hit squads into Mexico. It's pretty unbelievable when you think about the power of the American military, and our dollar and our economy and the way that we're able to make other countries bend to our will. Even today, as America's been weakened, we still exercise a huge amount of power, especially in the

Western Hemisphere. But think about the consequences of doing that, of invading Mexico. Half the world has already turned their backs on us over our support for Ukraine and Israel. And after Biden froze billions in Russian assets in America, the nations of the East are moving to create their own economies outside of the dollar system. If we invaded Mexico and were dickheads about it and did it without their permission and support from their government, we would just accelerate the decline of the dollar and thus America is the supreme nation of the world. That shit is just not going to happen. Just like Canada isn't going to become the 51st state, although it's hilarious to think about.

For one thing, the U.S. is already illegally operating in Mexico. It never stopped, actually. The DEA and the CIA stay having a presence there. That's how they were able to capture Mayo Zimbada last year. As we learned from our friend and former CISO, agent, Andrew Bustamante, the DEA's presence in Mexico or any foreign country is technically illegal. But we do it anyway and are usually tolerated by the host country because what the fuck are they going to do about it? So Trump's threat to send in hit teams is just a ratcheted up

version of the same thing. The same thing that year after year fails to stop drugs from coming into the United States. It's not going to stop, guys. I've been there. I've hung out. I've spoken with these people. The entire culture, the entire way of life in certain parts of Mexico, Mexico is exclusively dedicated to the pursuit of moving drugs into America. It's been that way for decades, and it's not going to stop with Trump or threats of assassination or arrests. They'll adapt. They already are. Today's episode is sponsored by BetterHelp. You know BetterHelp by now. They are the world's number one online therapy company. I use BetterHelp myself. I go to a therapist every week

that I got through the BetterHelp site. You know, therapy is really difficult just to make the first step in trying to go do. You have to find a therapist, usually through a recommendation. You don't know who you're going in to see. You have to go there. You have to meet a stranger in person. You've got to shell out a lot of money. And if it doesn't work out, you got to do it all over again. It's what prevents people from taking the step to, you know, try to take care of their mental health. And better help is solved that because you can do it online. It's all done through Zoom, through online medium exchanges, right so you sign up online you input all of your information better help will then put you pair you with a therapist that meets your specific needs that's what i love about it i got paired up with a guy who

i didn't jibe with so easily easily i let better help know and then they transfer me to somebody who i'm now with it's just that simple it's a very very seamless and much more affordable way to practice and do therapy a lot of stuff's happening right now the world is going mad a lot of little bit as well as this country. So it's wearing. I mean, I feel that every day. And I got a good life, but I still need to go talk my problems out, of which there are many. It comes from childhood. That's what I'm realizing. So yeah, I use better help. And it is, it's learned. It's taught me how to think. It's taught me how to think about my problems in a more productive way. And it just helps. It helps to talk to somebody. I can't recommend it enough. I will never stop.

And you, if you have not got started, need to do so. Check it out. BetterHelp is so cool because they have a network of more than 30,000 credentialed therapists with a wide range of specialties. And again, it's easy to switch therapists anytime at no extra cost. Discover your relationship green flags with BetterHelp. Visit BetterHelp.com slash connect, C-O-N-N-E-C-T to get 10% off your first month. Once again, that's better help, help.com slash connect. You guys, go be a friend to yourself, take care of your mental health, live a better, happier, more fulfilling life. All right. Hey guys, let's take a quick minute to thank Rocket Money for sponsoring this episode. Rocket Money is a longtime sponsor that Connect by now. I use Rocket Money because it's a personal

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You have all of these different things on auto pay with all of these companies. It's really difficult to keep track of what you still use and what you don't need anymore. Meanwhile, you're losing like hundreds of dollars a month. because you don't even know what's being drained out of your bank account. Rocket money helps you keep track of that, identify that, and we'll even reach out to some of these companies if you don't need to use them anymore and either negotiate a lower price or cancel your unwanted subscriptions for you. It's wild.

They're like a middleman for all of this stuff. So I definitely use them. I get alerts every day on my phone because I got money coming in and out of the account. I'm like, oh, wow, okay, I see exactly what's going on in my, you know, tiny little empire that I've built. right? So you should do that too because it saves literally thousands of dollars a year from going out of my account that I don't use. And it's not just me. Far from it. Rocket Money has over 5 million users and has saved a total of $500 million in canceled subscriptions, saving members up to $740 a year when using all the app's premium features.

Cancel your unwanted subscriptions and reach your financial goals faster with Rocket Money. Go to RocketMoney.com slash connect today. Once again, that's rocketmoney.com. slash connect, C-O-N-N-E-C-T. RocketMoney.com slash connect. Thank you, Rocket Money. Let's get back into the show. How can you send in troops to knock off kingpins when there are no more kingpins?

It's decentralizing. There's that word again. The whole structure of drug trafficking is changing. Look at what's going on in Kulia Khan, Sinaloa. There's a fentanyl cooking bonanza going on there right now among independent fentanyl cooks who have their own shops and sell their goods to drug traffickers,

associated with one of the two factions of what used to be the Sinaloa cartel, the side loyal to El Chapo and the other to Mayo. These are young men who apprentice as fentanyl cooks, learn the trade, and then if they're ambitious enough, strike out on their own. The New York Times actually ran a great article about this, which I'll talk a little bit more about at the end of the episode. But basically, they went and interviewed some of these different fent cooks

in these little towns on the outskirts of Kulia Kod. And like I said, most of these cooks are young men in their 20s. Some of them wanted to do other things, but they went and they learned the craft, they hired a crew, made connections, and now they can't supply enough of it. And these guys make millions, and they sell to different organizations. I mean, every now and then you'll get a fent cook who I'm sure belongs exclusively to one side of the other, the chapitos or the maitos, but a lot of these guys will just supply whoever needs it. And therefore, they can't really be considered part of a cartel because there are thousands

of these small little fent cooking operations going on all over northern Mexico. They sell fentanyl to these cartel guys who then hire out the transportation of said fentanyl to another set of independent operators, probably some business people who own trucking and logistics companies, who then move the product north until it reaches the border, where it is warehoused by another group of businessmen who own the warehouses until it is broken down and smuggled across the border by yet more independent operators who find and hire the drug mules willing to risk passing through American customs with the fentanyl in the traps of their cars or semi-trucks. The cartel is just the armed, organized entity who protect and facilitate this process by a mixture of murder, bribery, and intimidation. So you see what I mean on every step of the chain, of the smuggling chain, from the fentanyl cooks, all the way across the border to the cities and the junkies that consume it. It's all been decentralized, fractured into small different nodes or entities, right? The cartel is just the kind of overlord that protects that process. If I had to sum up what Mexican cartels are and what Mexican drug trafficking looks like, it is just that, an invisible, independent network of specialists, cooks, transporters,

smugglers, and distributors, working freely and based on the needs of supply and demand. In other words, the economy. And how the fuck are you supposed to assassinate an economy? Sure, the threat of violence might make them move more cautiously, but it's Mexico, and most of these guys aren't anticipating long, healthy lives to begin with. They've been through this tough on crime posturing from American presidents that go back to the beginning of Reagan. It's almost boring by now. Nothing can stop drug trafficking as long as there is demand.

I can't believe I still have to say that. I've been screaming that since the late 90s. Everybody knows it. Now, that's not as true when it comes to illegal immigration, which is the second biggest breadwinner for Mexican criminal organizations. Trump is threatening the most draconian sanctions on immigration since, well, Obama actually, who deported as many, if not more people than Trump did. But the rhetoric from Trump is powerful. He's threatening mass deportations in his first 100 days in office, plus beefed up border security,

an end to refugee status, and a return to the remain-in-Mexico policies of his first administration, which would force migrants seeking asylum status in the U.S. to remain in Mexico while they await their court appearance in America. He's also threatening more tariffs on Mexico if they don't do something about the immigrants crossing their southern border from Guatemala. All of this makes the smuggling and the living for these migrants, more expensive, dangerous, and for many of them, not worth it.

Of course, there will always be people desperate enough to try to enter the U.S. illegally, no matter how hard do we make it for them, but it will be small numbers compared to the cavalcade we just witnessed over the last four years. Some estimate that 10 million people entered the country illegally through the southern border during the Biden administration. I can't say for sure, but it's likely that many millions took advantage of the asylum status category and were simply caught and released into the U.S. This lax immigration enforcement was a bonanza for Mexican criminal groups,

effectively gifting them tens of billions of dollars a year from this migrant smuggling. But now that Trump is back and strict immigration laws will ostensibly start to be enforced again, this will cut substantially into the cartel smuggling bottom line. Now, it'll definitely make the price of getting smuggled across the border go up for sure. But that's not enough compared to the amount of would-be migrants will either self-deport are not bothered to take that perilous journey from whichever they're coming from in the first place, whether that's Haiti, Venezuela, Honduras, Colombia.

You know, it's just not going to make the journey worth it. Now, what this will do, this new enforcement of the remaining Mexico policy, is that a lot of these Central American migrants are going to remain in Mexico and become prey for Mexican criminal organizations. I mean, it's already happening, right? A lot of people spend all the money they have.

It's quite sad. I mean, if a Venezuelan peasant, puts together $10,000 to get smuggled and make that long-ass journey, cross the Dary and gap, go all the way up through Central America, through Mexico, probably endure crazy amounts of abuse. I mean, there's rape going on, there's kidnapping, there's, I mean, dying of hypothermia or heat stroke during the summer. I mean, there's all kinds of horrible things these people have to suffer just to get to the border to be turned away. they're not going to have any other choice. They're not going to be able to go back to the country they came from.

They're going to be stuck. So they're either going to try to cross the border, get caught and deported back to Mexico, or they're just going to stay in Mexico. And either some will get jobs at the Machiaadores, if they're lucky enough to be in a place like Tijuana or El Paso, where there's work. You can actually get a job in a factory. But a lot of them, especially the young men, are going to be recruited sometimes forcibly by these Mexican criminal. gangs. I'm going to do a whole other episode about that, but I promise you will actually see

Mexican cartels beef their numbers up with people that are non-Mexican. It's going to be pretty wild. You know, drugs are not like migrants, obviously. They're people. So it's always going to be easy to send a kilo of cocaine, no matter how strict the drug laws are, you can always get a pound of meth, put it in a FedEx box, and it's going to land in New York City. I mean, you cannot stop drugs, but you could really dampen down the flow of migrants. I mean, it already happened. Biden actually, for the past year and a half, has been cracking down on illegal immigration, and we've seen the lowest amount of illegal entry in years. And of course, you know, Trump in the right wing wants to prop up and make him look really bad, but the reality is they've been cracking

down for the last couple of years on immigration, and it works. The other thing I wanted to talk about is the fentanyl boom in Sinaloa going on. I said I was going to talk about that at the beginning of the video. This is what's so crazy to me about a place like Sinaloa and Kulia Khan. It is ground zero for drug trafficking in the Western Hemisphere, maybe the entire world, because the culture is dedicated to it. It's just been around for generations, five decades, really, since they started to grow marijuana back in the 1960s.

it is just very normal for young men to get involved in the drug trade. This is what this New York Times article was saying. You should go look it up. There is a fentanyl boom, and they've started to test fentanyl on bunny rabbits. I swear to God. Why? Good question. Because the fentanyl in the United States is becoming weaker.

So you've probably seen, if you follow the headlines, that there's been a huge drop in fentanyl overdoses in the United States in the past year and a half. There's a lot of speculation to why that is, but probably a good reason for it is, one, the dope fiends, the fentanyl addicts, are becoming immune to it, right? There's growing some tolerance. But the other speculation is that fentanyl is not as strong as it was at the beginning of the boom back in, you know, 2015 through 2021. A lot of that could have to do with cracking down on some of the precursor chemicals that are coming from China. Whatever it is, these young men, these different fentanyl cooking organizations, organizations throughout Sinaloa and northern Mexico are starting to experiment with the drug.

So what they'll do is they'll go buy a bunch of bunny rabbits, test a new fentanyl batch on them, and they say if the rabbits die right away, that's a good batch. It's kind of like a sick, twisted science experiment that these young fentanyl cooks are conducting. The point is, how can you stop that? How can Trump even imagine that sending in troops to eliminate a culture will stop drug trafficking. You can't because if you take out one fentanyl cook, another one across the mountain two miles away will start up. So the whole point of the decentralization,

the whole point of breaking down a hierarchical drug structure into these small independent nodes that operate with alliances, but they operate independently, that all happened in response to the government cracking down on them. The government going after the drug cartels in America and Mexico, it's kind of already happened. Look, you can't stop the tide of history. I think the thing that's working most against Mexican criminal organizations is development. It's not going to be Trump or anything America does.

Mexico is on its way to becoming a major player on the world economic stage, right? I just mentioned that transcontinental highway that they want to build. I mean, that is huge. That's going to make Mexico rich. than Panama with all that money they'll be able to get from taxing ships that are coming from Europe and Asia into the Americas. I mean, that'll be closer and more efficient. It's going to save everybody money. And yeah, it's going to make Mexico a wealthy country. Maybe not as much compared to the United States, but pretty close. So when that happens, you're just going to have

less Mexican politicians that are going to want to accept drug money in the first place, right? you'll probably see the strengthening of institutions and you know little by little and it might not be 10 years from now it might take 50 100 years but by then drugs are going to be legal and taxable so you're just going to see mexico become richer more law abiding and you know it's going to turn these criminal groups into criminals because as it stands right now they're still accepted somewhat by the society. It's entrenched. It's like the Italian mafia. Part of them is still looked at by the population like Robin Hoods, but I think this war in Kuleikon right now, I think it's shredding that illusion. It was a long time coming. It was betrayal after betrayal after betrayal after betrayal.

And something like that can't stand. That's a house of cards. Who will win the war? The Chapitos or the Maitos? I don't know. It really depends on who has the war chest. Who has the war chest? the numbers and ultimately who can broker a deal with Mexico City with the federal government. Who can make those connections to say, hey, I will make sure the violence stops. I will make sure that the drug money is controlled by one organization and we will start paying you guys off. I will make sure you get your taste. Those are probably going to be the people who emerge victorious.

And the way that will happen is two things. A lot of bloodshed. The citizens will become tired of it. And somebody will make that deal. And then they, the military, the Mexican military, who's very capable when they want to be, the Mexican Marines will move in and they'll decapitate whoever is left on the losing side. That's probably how it will happen. But it's ugly down there.

A lot of people are dying. A YouTuber, a couple of YouTubers from Kulia Khan who are supposed to be civilians, have ended up dead. So it's a really messy situation. And it's unfortunate. It's unfortunate for the people of Kulia Khan and for the people trying to traffic drugs. Now, the fentanyl cooks are being targeted. If you want to attack the other side, you go after their drug suppliers. So, you know, look, it is messy now, but the future, in my opinion, looks bright for Mexico

because what this war, this drug war is doing is exposing who the criminals are. and it's creating a clear line between law and order versus criminality. And I wanted to talk about this before I leave. As of this recording, January 21st, Mayo Zambada is now in a New York City courtroom making a deal with the United States government. That's what I mean when I say all kingpins become rats. Chopo did it. Beltran Leva did it before him.

On and on and on. They all give up information to save themselves. And that's because nobody wants to spend the rest of the lives in an American prison. If they can avoid it, unfortunately, Chapo couldn't, right? He didn't give up enough people quickly enough. And he had too much publicity. We can't let him go. We can't cut a deal at that point.

It's bad press for us. But all Mexican cartels and their kingpins, their leaders, these are pampered guys. You know, like, Mayo's lived free for five decades. And he's 78 years old and probably won't be around that long anyway. it's nothing for him to give up info on the other side, right? Especially because the guys who put him in prison, the guys who delivered him to the CIA are two of Chappos kids, who, by the way, are also making deals.

So right now there is a snitching boom going on amongst Mexican cartels. Don't get it twisted. Don't let anyone tell you anything different about loyalty. There is no loyalty, especially when it comes to these organizations. It's just business and save yourself. That's the reality. In my opinion, being one of these independent fentanyl cooks drug suppliers is the best position to be in. Because you're not involved in politics.

You're not killing people. You are with your drugs, but you're not holding a gun. You're not going to war for these guys who don't care about you. Fentanol and drug trafficking in Mexico at large, whether it's cocaine, methamphetamine, marijuana. It's becoming like the drug trade is in the United States. how I operated during the weed boom of Northern California and Oregon during the mid-2000s. We were all independent operators who were supplying the U.S. market with this marijuana that was the best. And nobody was part of a cartel.

We were all just people getting money. That's kind of how Mexican drug traffickers would become. You know, these independent people who are just out there supplying what, Americans crave decade after decade. My final thoughts about Trump and his plan for the cartels, I don't think much will change. I think it's already changing because of forces of history, because the forces of economies are changing, because Mexico is changing. I think Trump is just there barking. He's just doing what politicians do. He's threatening. He's, you know, fanning the flames of what Americans want to hear, whose children have died, have drug overdoses,

right? He's just being a politician. I don't think much will change. I think they will absolutely keep incarcerating a lot of these fentanyl trafficking and drug trafficking groups. They'll keep giving them life sentences. But I don't think a lot will change in Kulia Khan, in Sinaloa, in the rural mountains of Mexico. They've been getting it for years, for decades, for generations, and they'll keep getting it as long as drugs are illegal in the United States, as long as Americans keep demanding it, you know. All right, you guys, that's been today's episode. Thank you so much for watching.

We are going to keep doing these topical videos every week. We want to keep you updated with the most current topical news pieces when it comes to Narcos and the greater world of crime. Do me a favor if you haven't subscribed to the channel. Go hit that subscribe button. Leave us a like and a comment. Follow me on all socials. My name is Johnny Mitchell.

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