Mexico’s president said Thursday that the country’s violent criminal gangs and drug cartels are essentially “respectful people” who “respect the citizenry” and mostly just kill one another.
The claims by President Andrés Manuel López Obrador are clearly at odds with the fact of tens of millions of Mexicans who live in areas dominated by drug cartels. The cartels routinely demand protection payments from local residents and kill or kidnap them in the event that they refuse to pay.
A reporter asked López Obrador whether drug cartels behaved well when he visited the township of Badiraguato, Sinaloa — the hometown of imprisoned drug lord Joaquín “El Chapo” Guzmán, which he has controversially visited as president a few half dozen times.
“Always!” López Obrador responded, adding that “Sometimes we come upon people who find themselves strange, but respectful.”
Continuing with reference to drug cartels at his morning news briefing, López Obrador said “There is something people should know.”
“Fortunately, the attacks that occur on this country generally occur between (criminal) groups,” the president said. “They respect the citizenry.”
López Obrador has long refused to directly confront the cartels, who he claims were forced into criminality by an absence of opportunities. His “Hugs, not bullets” strategy offers job training programs for teens so that they won’t grow to be cartel gunmen.
In the past, he has also appeared to normalize the gangs’ presence, encouraging Mexicans to barter peace pacts among the many cartels.
But saying the cartels don’t attack common residents takes the difficulty to a recent level. Experts and rights activists say hundreds of Mexicans have been forced from their homes by cartel violence and extortion, and hundreds of business owners, taxi and bus drivers have been killed for refusing extortion demands.
Clandestine grave sites throughout Mexico are stuffed with the bodies of drug cartel victims.
Thursday’s statements by López Obrador come one week after he said he won’t fight Mexican drug cartels on U.S. orders. In what the president called a “Mexico First” policy, he said “We should not going to act as policemen for any foreign government. Mexico First. Our home comes first.”
Over the years, López Obrador has laid out various justifications for his policy of avoiding clashes with the cartels. In the past he has said “you can not fight violence with violence,” and on other occasions he has argued the federal government has to deal with “the causes” of drug cartel violence, ascribing them to poverty or an absence of opportunities.
López Obrador has also encouraged leaders of the Catholic church to try to barter peace pacts between warring gangs.
Explaining why he has ordered the military to not attack cartel gunmen, he said in 2022 that “we also care for the lives of the gang members, they’re human beings.”
He has also sometimes appeared to not take the violence issue seriously. In June 2023, he said of 1 drug gang that had abducted 14 law enforcement officials: “I’m going to inform on you to your fathers and grandfathers,” suggesting they need to get a great spanking.
Asked about those comments on the time, residents of 1 town within the western Mexico state of Michoacán who’ve lived under drug cartel control for years reacted with disgust and disbelief.
“He is making fun of us,” said one restaurant owner, who asked to stay anonymous because he — like almost everyone else on the town — has long been forced to pay protection money to the local cartel.
López Obrador has also made a degree of visiting the township of Badiraguato in Sinaloa state not less than a half dozen times, and pledging to accomplish that again before he leaves office in September.
It’s also a stance related to prickly nationalism and independence. Asked in November why he has visited the sparsely populated rural township so repeatedly, López Obrador quoted a line from a defiant old drinking song, “because I would like to.”
The president has also imposed strict limits on U.S. agents operating in Mexico, and limited how much contact Mexican law enforcement can have with them.
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