Sheinbaum defends transfer of 37 cartel operatives to US as a ‘sovereign decision’

Mexico’s President Claudia Sheinbaum has defended the transfer of 37 Mexican cartel operatives to the United States as a “sovereign decision”, saying her government is trying to alleviate pressure from the Trump administration. It was the third such flight this year since Donald Trump returned to the White House.

The group included high-level figures from the Cartel Jalisco Nueva Generación and Cartel del Noreste, and Pedro Inzunza Noriega, who in May 2025 was the first person charged with narco-terrorism by the US Department of Justice. The flights have been carried out outside the usual extradition process, prompting legal questions; Mexico’s security minister, Omar García Harfuch, wrote on X that the people were “high impact criminals” who “represented a real threat to the country’s security.” So far 92 cartel figures have been sent.

The transfers come amid repeated accusations from President Trump that Mexico is “run by cartels” and a looming threat of unilateral US action. The article said the US military extracted Nicolás Maduro from Venezuela at the start of the year and has carried out strikes on alleged drug‑trafficking boats in the Pacific and Caribbean, and the US government has reportedly pushed for military involvement in joint operations on Mexican soil to dismantle fentanyl laboratories—an option Sheinbaum has rejected as a matter of sovereignty.

Key Topics

World, Claudia Sheinbaum, Donald Trump, Jalisco Nueva Generación, Cartel Del Noreste, Pedro Inzunza Noriega