U.S. law enforcement officials have been investigating claims for years that allies of Mexican President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador met with cartels and drug traffickers and received millions of dollars after he took office, according to investigative reporting. USA, and according to three people who are knowledgeable about the matter.
The United States never opened a formal investigation into López Obrador, and the officials who were conducting the investigation ultimately shelved it. They concluded that the U.S. government was little willing to pursue allegations that could implicate the leader of one of the country’s key allies, said the three people with knowledge of the case, who were not authorized to speak publicly.
López Obrador said that the above was “completely false” when answering the questions. He stated that the news of the investigation would not affect “in any way” Mexico’s relationship with the United States but that he expected a response from the US government.
Recent efforts by US officials identified possible links between the cartels and associates of Lopez Obrador, with the investigation finding no direct link to the president. US officials declined to comment as much of the information collected by US officials came from informants whose accounts may be difficult to verify.
Records show that an informant told investigators that one of López Obrador’s closest confidants met with Ismael Zambada García, a top leader of the Sinaloa drug cartel, before his victory in the 2018 election. A different source told them that after the president’s election, a founder of the notoriously violent Zetas cartel paid $4 million to two of López Obrador’s allies in hopes of getting out of prison. Investigators obtained information from a third source that suggested drug cartels had videos of the president’s children collecting drug money, records show. López Obrador denied all the claims.
U.S. law enforcement officials also traced payments from people they believed were cartel agents to López Obrador’s middlemen, two of the sources said. At least one of those payments, they said, was made around the same time López Obrador traveled to Sinaloa in 2020 and met the mother of drug lord El Chapo, who is now serving a life sentence in a US prison.
At least one of those payments, they said, was made around the same time that Lopez Obrador moved to the state of Sinaloa in March 2020 and met with the mother of drug traffickers Joaquin Guzman Loera, known as El Chapo, who is now serving a sentence. Of life imprisonment in the US federal prison.
For the United States to pursue criminal charges against senior foreign officials is unusual and complex. It would be tough to build a legal case against López Obrador. The last time the United States brought criminal charges against a senior Mexican official, it ended up dropping them after the arrest caused a diplomatic rift with Mexico.
