ARI SHAPIRO, HOST:
One of the world's most notorious drug lords is now under arrest in the United States. The man known as El Mayo co-founded the Sinaloa Cartel. It's the No. 1 producer of fentanyl in the world. He was reportedly lured into flying to the U.S. Attorney General Merrick Garland said the operation was part of the fight against those responsible for the fentanyl epidemic.
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MERRICK GARLAND: The Justice Department will not rest until every single cartel leader, member and associate responsible for poisoning our communities is held accountable.
SHAPIRO: NPR's Eyder Peralta is following this story from his base in Mexico City. Hi, Eyder.
EYDER PERALTA, BYLINE: Hey, Ari.
SHAPIRO: Tell us more about this man who was arrested. Who is the drug lord?
PERALTA: So Ismael "El Mayo" Zambada co-founded the Sinaloa Cartel, along with Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzman. He has been described as being both as famous as El Chapo and as powerful as Pablo Escobar. But there's one big difference. Ismael "El Mayo" Zambada has always kept a low profile. And here in Mexico, he's been almost mythical, a man who appears every now and then like a ghost. He famously slipped a note to a TV variety show host who mistakenly read it out loud. It said, I'm here. But when the camera panned to the audience, it didn't find him.
And back in 2010, he sent another note the late Julio Scherer Garcia, the famous author and journalist. He didn't want an interview. He just wanted to meet this legendary journalist. And Scherer describes a person who got into who got into the drug trade at 16 years old, a man who evaded capture because he had intimate knowledge of Mexico's mountains but also a man dreading his inevitable capture. And he tells this journalist, you know, even if they capture me, even if the government executes me in public, nothing will change. Millions depend on the drug trade. He said, quote, "as far as the bosses, even if you jail them, extradite them, kill them, their replacements are already there."
SHAPIRO: So he's this larger-than-life, almost mythic figure. What's the reality?
PERALTA: U.S. authorities charged El Mayo Zambada for the first time way back in 2003. He's accused of shipping tons of drugs into the United States. And one of his sons, who's in jail in the United States, testified that he used millions of dollars to bribe high-ranking Mexican officials. Zambada became much more important after El Chapo Guzman was arrested. El Chapo is serving a life sentence in the United States. So under Zambada's leadership, the Sinaloa Cartel became the biggest exporter of fentanyl in the world. And fentanyl is killing tens of thousands of Americans every year. It's the worst drug epidemic the country has ever experienced. And when you add to that the violence that has killed so many in Mexico, it makes Zambada a lot more than just, you know, the farmer that he likes to portray himself as.
SHAPIRO: Part of his legend is that he was impossible to catch. And so how did authorities actually do at this time?
PERALTA: Ari, on the record, American officials are saying very little. The Wall Street Journal and The Associated Press are both citing anonymous American officials, saying Zambada was tricked, that somehow, U.S. law enforcement got him on a plane. The Journal reports Zambada thought he was going to supervise clandestine airfields, but instead, he ended up at a tiny airport in New Mexico not far from El Paso, Texas.
What's more, it was not just Zambada who ended up there but also Joaquin Guzman Lopez, one of El Chapo's sons and another leader of the Sinaloa Cartel. He's also in custody and facing a slew of drug trafficking-related charges. The Mexican government said the U.S. ambassador to Mexico called the country's top security official only after both of these men had been taken into custody.
SHAPIRO: So the Mexican government knew nothing about this before it unfolded.
PERALTA: That is what they're telling us. Mexico's top security official, Rosa Icela Rodriguez, says all they know is that an American plane with an American pilot left Hermosillo yesterday morning. The manifest showed only the pilot on board, and only he went through immigration. The plane, she said, left with one person and landed in the United States with three. During his morning press briefing, Mexican President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador stood there, saying he knew just as much as we did.
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PRESIDENT ANDRES MANUEL LOPEZ OBRADOR: (Speaking Spanish).
PERALTA: "How does one become three?" - he asked.
President Lopez Obrador left open two possibilities. Maybe, he said, the U.S. negotiated a surrender, or maybe they had intelligence on Zambada's travel.
SHAPIRO: Why would the U.S. keep Mexico in the dark about this?
PERALTA: Look. U.S. officials have not said anything about that, but top government officials in Mexico have, in the recent past, been convicted for being part of the Sinaloa cartel. So you can imagine that the U.S. didn't want to tip anyone off an operation. But, you know, something important about this arrest is that Zambada, one of the most powerful men in Mexico, will go to trial, and we are likely to hear testimony exactly about those connections between the Mexican government and criminal organizations. And that may very well give us an idea of why the U.S. kept Mexican officials in the dark.
SHAPIRO: You quoted Zambada as saying, "even if you jail, extradite or kill the bosses, their replacements are already there." Is that true? Does this big arrest actually change anything? Is it likely to limit the amount of drugs coming into the United States?
PERALTA: I mean, every analyst I've talked to says, don't hold your breath. This is, no doubt, a huge win for American law enforcement, but it's not a silver bullet. The demand for drugs in the United States hasn't changed. So the profit incentive remains in Mexico. One big worry, though, is that these two arrests leave a huge power vacuum, and that is likely to lead to a spike in violence as armed groups fight to take El Mayo's place.
SHAPIRO: That's NPR's Eyder Peralta in Mexico City. Thanks for your reporting.
PERALTA: Thank you, Ari.
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