The president of Mexico, Claudia Sheinbaum, has denied that her government has any evidence linking Venezuelan leader Nicolas Maduro to the Sinaloa Cartel, a criminal network based in her country.
Sheinbaum’s statements on Friday were prompted by an announcement one day earlier that the United States would double its reward for information leading to Maduro’s arrest, putting the current reward at $50m.
The administration of US President Donald Trump claimed Maduro was “one of the largest narco-traffickers in the world” and that he had direct ties to the Sinaloa Cartel, as well as two other Venezuelan gangs.
Sheinbaum was asked about those allegations in her morning news conference on Friday. She answered that this week was the first time she had heard of such accusations.
“On Mexico’s part, there is no investigation that has to do with that,” Sheinbaum said. “As we always say, if they have some evidence, show it. We do not have any proof.”
A history of ‘maximum pressure’
Mexico has long maintained diplomatic relations with Venezuela, while the US has broken its ties with the government in Caracas over questions about the legitimacy of Maduro’s presidency.
Instead, the US has recognised candidates from Venezuela’s opposition coalition as the country’s rightful leaders, and it has also heavily sanctioned Maduro and his allies.
Trump, in particular, has had a rocky relationship with Maduro over his years as president. During his first term, from 2017 to 2021, Trump pursued a campaign of “maximum pressure” against Maduro, which included an initial reward of $15m.
That amount was later raised to $25m during the final weeks of President Joe Biden’s presidency, in reaction to Maduro’s hotly contested re-election to a third term in 2024.
Election observers said that the vote had not been “democratic“, and the opposition coalition published raw vote tallies that appeared to contradict the government’s official results.
But as Trump began his second term on January 20, critics speculated that the Republican leader would soften his approach to Maduro in order to seek assistance with his campaign of mass deportation.
Venezuela has a history of refusing to accept deportees from the US.
Since then, Trump has sent envoy Richard Grenell to the Venezuelan capital of Caracas and secured deals that saw US citizens released from Venezuelan custody. Venezuela has also accepted to receive deportation flights from the US in recent months.
But the Trump administration has maintained it has no intention of recognising Maduro’s government.
Legitimising claims of an ‘invasion’
The accusations against Maduro further another Trump goal: legitimising his sweeping claims to executive power.
Since returning to office in January, Trump has invoked emergency measures, including the Alien Enemies Act of 1798, to facilitate his policy goals, including his campaign of mass deportation.
Trump was re-elected on a hardline platform that conflated immigration with criminality.
But in order to use the Alien Enemies Act, a wartime law, Trump had to show that either the country was engaged in a “declared war” or that it faced an “invasion or predatory incursion” from a foreign nation.
To meet that requirement, Trump has blamed Venezuela for masterminding a criminal “invasion” of the US.
On Thursday, Trump’s Attorney General Pam Bondi also accused Maduro of working hand in hand with the cartels to profit from their drug-smuggling enterprises.
“Maduro uses foreign terrorist organisations like TdA [Tren de Aragua], Sinaloa and Cartel of the Suns to bring deadly drugs and violence into our country,” Bondi said in a video.
“To date, the DEA [Drug Enforcement Administration] has seized 30 tonnes of cocaine linked to Maduro and his associates, with nearly seven tonnes linked to Maduro himself, which represents a primary source of income for the deadly cartels based in Venezuela and Mexico.”
But in May, a declassified intelligence memo from the US government cast doubt on the allegation that Maduro is puppeteering gang activity in the US.
“While Venezuela’s permissive environment enables TDA to operate, the Maduro regime probably does not have a policy of cooperating with TDA and is not directing TDA movement to and operations in the United States,” the memo said.
Venezuelan Foreign Minister Yvan Gil responded to Bondi’s claims on Thursday by calling them “the most ridiculous smokescreen ever seen”.
