Mexico’s presidential front-runner doesn’t want to escalate drug war
MEXICO CITY — Mexico is coming off its deadliest year in recent history. Record amounts of opioids and cocaine are being seized en route to the United States. Mexico’s army patrols cities in wide swaths of the country, its navy busts down doors on raids against drug cartel bosses.
Andrés Manuel López Obrador, the front-runner in the leadup to Sunday’s presidential election, is touting a gentler approach.
Abrazos, no balazos —or “hugs, not gunfire” — has been a campaign slogan.
The leftist politician is pledging to alleviate poverty as a way to solve the crisis of violence here, while maintaining a partnership with the United States. “You can’t fight fire with fire,” López Obrador has repeated.
The next president’s approach will probably have far-reaching consequences on both sides of the border. It could impact how much heroin and other opiates circulate in American cities, how many Mexicans cross into the United States fleeing violence, and how much illicit narco-cash floods Mexican society, corrupting police and politicians.
Violence has reached record levels in Mexico, with nearly 30,000 homicides last year, the highest in two decades of available statistics. Traditional drug cartels have splintered into increasingly violent rival factions that extort, kidnap, steal
gas and rob trains, in addition to selling drugs. During the electoral campaign, which also featured races for governors, congressional representatives and local lawmakers, some 130 politicians and campaign workers have been killed.
“Insecurity is the number one problem in the country,” said Marcos Fastlicht, a prominent businessman and one of six security advisers on López Obrador’s team.
But López Obrador’s vague proposals have left security experts confused about whether he represents a fundamental departure from how previous Mexican presidents have dealt with drugs and violence, and whether he might weaken the security partnership with the United States. Over the past two Mexican administrations, U.S. agencies such as the Drug Enforcement Administration and FBI have worked especially
closely with their Mexican counterparts in the hunt for drug traffickers, providing intelligence and equipment, and partnering on missions.
López Obrador is a longtime leftist politician who has steadily moved to the center in recent years. Before the last election in 2012, he called for blocking U.S. intelligence work in Mexico. In this campaign, however, he has called for a robust relationship with the United States on trade and security.