Mexican president denies deal to target drug cartels in place with US

Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum on Tuesday denied that her government has any agreement with Washington on a bilateral project to dismantle drug cartels.

On Monday, the US Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) announced a “bold bilateral initiative” with Mexico to fight drug cartels, an operation initiative named “Project Portero.” However, Sheinbaum said that Mexico had not been consulted on the matter.

“The DEA issued this statement, we don’t know on what basis,” Sheinbaum said during her daily press briefing. “We have not reached any agreement, there is no deal between our security institutions and the DEA.”

Sheinbaum added that Mexico’s Foreign Ministry and the US State Department had been working for months on a security agreement that is “about to be signed.”

“This deal is fundamentally based on sovereignty, mutual trust, and territorial respect … and coordination without subordination,” she said, adding that the only other ongoing bilateral security activity was a group of Mexican police officers attending a workshop in Texas.

“That is all there is. There is nothing else,” the president continued, adding: “We do not know why they issued this statement.”

“The only thing we will always ask for is respect. Always. If you are going to report something related to Mexico that is part of the security issue, we ask that it be done within the framework of the collaboration we have.”

In its statement, the DEA said Project Portero would target drug cartel operatives who control the smuggling corridors along the US south-western border by bringing together Mexican investigators and US authorities.

“Project Portero and this new training program show how we will fight – by planning and operating side by side with our Mexican partners, and by bringing the full strength of the U.S. government to bear,” said DEA Administrator Terrance Cole in the statement, calling the project “a bold first step in a new era of cross-border enforcement.”

Sheinbaum’s rebuttal comes after a positive exchange in late July, when US President Donald Trump delayed higher tariffs on Mexican goods.

In addition to tariffs, Trump and Sheinbaum have been clashing on cross-border migration from Mexico into the United States and Trump’s attempts to stop the flow of the opioid fentanyl into the US.

Sheinbaum in recent months has agreed to extradite dozens of high-profile drug-trafficking suspects to the US.