Mexican Senator Breaks Ranks, Echoes Trump: Cartels Grip Mexico's Power Structures

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MEXICO CITY – November 1, 2025  In a stunning rebuke to her own nation's leadership, prominent Mexican Senator Lily Tellez declared Friday that U.S. President Donald Trump is "not lying" about Mexico being effectively ruled by drug cartels, igniting a firestorm of debate across the border just days after Trump's latest pointed criticisms of Mexican governance.

Tellez, a fierce critic of Mexico's ruling Morena party and a former journalist known for her unyielding stance against organized crime, delivered her remarks in a raw, unfiltered video posted to social media. "Trump is right. Mexico is ruled by cartels," she said bluntly, adding, "He is not lying, it’s the truth, and the people of Mexico know it." The senator's words come amid escalating U.S.-Mexico tensions over drug trafficking, with Trump designating major cartels like the Sinaloa and Jalisco New Generation as terrorist organizations earlier this year—a move that has strained bilateral relations while amplifying calls for aggressive intervention.

Tellez didn't mince words in assigning blame, accusing former President Andrés Manuel López Obrador and his successor, current President Claudia Sheinbaum, of colluding with narco-traffickers to secure electoral victories and subsequently transforming Mexico into what she termed a "narco-state." She pointed to U.S. law enforcement intelligence as irrefutable evidence, claiming it substantiates Trump's repeated assertions that cartels hold de facto control over swaths of Mexican territory. "They have infested our institutions," Tellez warned, referencing the infiltration of government ranks by cartel allies.

At the center of her accusations is Adán Augusto López, López Obrador's former Secretary of the Interior and now a key Morena senator aligned with Sheinbaum. Tellez labeled him the "Godfather" of the Barredora faction within the Jalisco New Generation Cartel, a powerful splinter group notorious for extortion, assassinations, and fentanyl production. López, who has not been formally charged, has denied any wrongdoing, but Tellez's claims echo ongoing U.S. investigations into high-level corruption, including the recent sentencing of ex-security chief Genaro García Luna to 38 years in a U.S. prison for Sinaloa Cartel bribes.

Tellez's personal history lends visceral weight to her testimony. Before entering politics, she built a career as a television anchor exposing cartel-prosecutor ties in Mexico City. In 2000, she survived a brazen assassination attempt by gunmen, an ordeal that left her with lasting scars—both physical and ideological. "I've seen their violence up close," she recounted in the video. "And now, it's in the halls of power."

The senator's intervention arrives at a precarious moment for U.S.-Mexico relations. Trump, fresh off his reelection, has ratcheted up rhetoric portraying Mexico as a "fairy tale" kingdom besieged by "evil" cartels, even as he praised Sheinbaum as a "very brave woman" last week. In a White House briefing on October 24, Trump reiterated his willingness to deploy U.S. forces against narco-labs and kingpins, drawing parallels to recent naval actions off Venezuela's coast. "The cartels are trying to destroy our country," he said, floating military strikes that could target operations just south of the border.

Mexican officials, however, have pushed back hard. Sheinbaum's administration condemned Trump's "slanderous" narrative as baseless and insulting, emphasizing Mexico's "verifiable efforts" against organized crime, including the extradition of cartel figures and joint operations with U.S. agencies. Economy Minister Marcelo Ebrard fired off a pointed rebuke on social media, accusing Trump of using cartel allegations as a smokescreen for disruptive tariffs on North American trade. "This is an insult to our country and a pretext to distract from your own mistakes," Ebrard wrote.Critics on both sides of the border warn that Tellez's alignment with Trump's worldview risks further eroding sovereignty and fueling diplomatic fallout. "No one denies corruption in Mexico, but framing it as a willing government-cartel alliance oversimplifies a complex crisis," said security analyst Carlos Pérez Ricart. He highlighted how U.S. gun flows—responsible for up to 70% of cartel weaponry—exacerbate the violence, while Mexico prioritizes reducing homicides over high-profile arrests that often spark retaliatory wars, as seen in the ongoing Sinaloa infighting that has claimed nearly 2,000 lives since the 2024 arrest of cartel co-founder Ismael "El Mayo" Zambada.

Yet Tellez's voice resonates with a growing chorus of Mexicans weary of the bloodshed. Polls show about 31% support for U.S. intervention in cartel hotspots like Sinaloa, where businesses reel from extortion and daily terror. "We're not asking for invasion," Tellez clarified. "We're asking for truth—and action."As Trump prepares to host Sheinbaum for high-stakes talks next month, Tellez's defection underscores a deeper fracture: a neighbor haunted by shared demons, where fentanyl floods U.S. streets and narco-graves multiply in Mexican soil. Whether her words catalyze cooperation or catastrophe remains the story unfolding—one cartel stronghold at a time. 17GEN4.com