What López-Obrador doesn't know

By Silvio Canto, Jr.

Up in Washington, the information about Mexico's cartels was not good. This is the story:

Mexican President Andrés Manuel López Obrador on Friday pushed back against estimates made this week about the strength of Mexican drug cartels by the top U.S. counter-narcotics official, saying the United States lacked "good information."

The comments come in response to testimony from U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) Chief Anne Milgram on Mexican cartels as part of a hearing in the U.S. Congress.

Among other findings, Milgram testified the DEA estimated that the powerful Sinaloa Cartel and Jalisco New Generation Cartel (CJNG) have more than 45,000 members, associates, facilitators and brokers in some 100 countries.

She added Sinaloa and CJNG have a presence in 21 and 19 of Mexico's 31 states respectively and that the DEA is mapping how both have spread around the world.

"No," the president said in response to a question from a journalist about if the information from the U.S. official were true. "They don't have good information."

Speaking at a press conference, Lopez Obrador questioned her figures and urged the DEA to share more details.

"We don't have that information. I don't know where the woman from the DEA got it," he said.

Wait a minute. The "woman" that President López-Obrador referred to is U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) chief Anne Milgram.

Why does the DEA have to share more details? Shouldn't President López-Obrador share information to contradict the "woman from the DEA," as he called her?

We have seen this side of López-Obrador before. He mocks his critics and questions their credibility. Again, he is attacking the DEA chief. My guess is that he is mocking Chief Milgram because her comments hit a nerve.

To be realistic, nothing is going to happen until President Biden picks up the phone and delivers a stern message. Is that going to happen? Probably not. After all, the Biden administration is currently in a legal fight with Texas over border barriers rather than doing something about the source.

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