From 2006 to 2012, during Felipe Calderón’s presidency, Genaro García Luna was Mexico’s top law enforcement official. He was responsible for developing a strategy to counter the powerful drug cartels and for sharing intelligence with US officials. He was also on the payroll of the Sinaloa cartel.
In October, García Luna — who was arrested in Dallas in 2019 — was sentenced by a federal judge in Brooklyn to 38 years in prison, a dramatic downfall for a man who once headed Mexico’s federal police and, according to testimony, received millions of dollars. dollars in bribes and served as the cartel’s de facto protector.
García Luna, 56, is the highest-ranking Mexican official ever convicted of corruption, and his harsh sentencing sends a message to other government officials, the judge who oversaw the trial said. At the very least, corrupt officials from Mexico and elsewhere will avoid setting foot on U.S. soil. But most importantly, it shows that the US still has strong accountability tools.
These tools also include the work of the Drug Enforcement Administration, the FBI and Homeland Security Investigations, which were instrumental in the arrest last August of Ismael Zambada, leader of the Sinaloa Cartel. That blindsided Mexican officials, who were unaware of the operation that led to the drug lord’s arrest.
U.S. officials are unlikely to fully regain trust with their Mexican counterparts, but the timing of García Luna’s conviction offers an opportunity to re-engage in bilateral cooperation to fight drug traffickers and corruption. This has been seriously damaged in recent years under the rule of Andrés Manuel López Obrador.
There is a new Mexican president, Claudia Sheinbaum, and soon there will be a new US administration. Better cooperation can lead to better results in the fentanyl war, while improving public safety and strengthening Mexico’s institutions.
We are not naive about the prospects. Sheinbaum will likely continue López Obrador’s policy of non-confrontation with the cartels, and she now leads a country in which her predecessor allowed the Mexican armed forces to gain more strength, power and influence.
This is not something to take lightly, and the case of General Salvador Cienfuegos looms large. The Mexican general was arrested by US officials in 2020 and accused of protecting drug lords, but the charges were dropped after political and diplomatic pressure. The US capitulated after López Obrador threatened to expel the DEA.
Since then, the Mexican military’s power has grown and it now oversees major infrastructure projects, tourism development, port management and even public health, often under unwritten agreements and with little oversight, opening the door for corruption.
The US must remain vigilant, even as restoring drug enforcement cooperation must be a priority for the next administration. García Luna’s conviction and other recent sentences against former Latin American government officials send the right message: there is zero tolerance for corrupt officials.
– Dallas Morning News
From 2006 to 2012, during Felipe Calderón’s presidency, Genaro García Luna was Mexico’s top law enforcement officer.
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