El Chapo’s family members cross US border in apparent deal with Trump administration

Mexican officials said Wednesday that 17 family members of drug cartel leaders crossed into the United States last week as part of a deal between a son of the former head of the Sinaloa Cartel and the Trump administration.

Mexican Security Secretary Omar García Harfuch confirmed a report by independent journalist Luis Chaparro that family members of Ovidio Guzmán López had entered the U.S. Lopez, the son of imprisoned Sinaloa Cartel boss Joaquín “El Chapo” Guzmán, was extradited to the U.S. in 2023. 

Among the family members allowed into the U.S. was Guzman’s former wife, Griselda López Pérez. 

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In a radio interview, García Harfuch said it was clear to Mexican authorities the deal was made during negotiations between Guzmán López and the U.S. government.

“It is evident that his family is going to the U.S. because of a negotiation or an offer that the Department of Justice is giving him,” García Harfuch said.

None of the family was being pursued by Mexican authorities. 

Video footage posted online Tuesday by Spanish-language outlet Radio Formula shows Guzmán’s family carrying luggage as they wait to be processed at the Tijuana/San Diego border crossing. They reportedly packed $70,000 in cash with them.

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The confirmation by García Harfuch came the same day the office of U.S. Attorney General Pam Bondi announced it was charging a number of top cartel leaders with “narcoterrorism” for the first time since the Trump administration declared a number of cartels as foreign terrorist organizations.

“Let me be direct, to the leaders of the Sinaloa Cartel, you are no longer the hunters, you are the hunted,” U.S. Attorney Adam Gordon for the Southern District of California said. “You will be betrayed by your friends, you will be hounded by your enemies and you will ultimately find yourself and your face here in a courtroom in the Southern District of California.”

Guzmán López, 35, also known as “the Mouse,” is one of the four of Guzmán’s sons known as “Los Chapitos,” who ran the Sinaloa Cartel in their father’s absence. At his peak, the elder Guzmán was one of the most powerful drug traffickers in the world, turning the Sinaloa Cartel into a major force and one of the largest groups responsible for illegal drugs pouring into the U.S. 

He was arrested and extradited to the U.S. in 2017 and convicted of drug trafficking and other crimes. He is imprisoned in Colorado. 

The Associated Press contributed to this report.