The other day Joe sent me a WSJ piece [gift link I think] about Claudia Sheinbaum and the problems she’s having with Trump. I want to pick out some key points and then give an update on a story that’s a big deal in Mexico but is all-but-forgotten here: the death of two CIA agents in Chihuahua.
Here are the key points I want to talk about:
Former President Andrés Manuel López Obrador (AMLO) and his supporters are hovering around in the background pulling strings. That’s a paraphrase, but I think it’s almost totally false. AMLO is famous for not even having a cell phone — he gets his news from staffers a day or two late. He’s been staying at his ranch writing books that emphasize Mexico’s rightful place in the world. His first thick tome, Grandeza, came out last December, and his next one, Gloria, is a work in progress. His only public statements about Claudia have stated that he will intervene only if he thinks that her presidency or Mexican sovereignty is in danger. AMLO is a huge ego and a bit of an oddball, but his ego is so big that, paradoxically, it’s attached to the success of Claudia and the Fourth Transformation of Mexico, the project of the Morena Party that he founded. This is the key point to understanding his actions: he wants to be judged as a transformational Mexican hero, and the only way that happens is if the transformation is successful. He didn’t pick a weak predecessor, for this very reason.
Cuba is a problem for Claudia because the Trump embargo has kept her from sending oil to the island. This is true, and something to watch, though Mexico has been consistently sending humanitarian aid to Cuba. AMLO started a charity to do that, and Claudia contributed to it as a private citizen. (The way this charity was rolled out made it clear that AMLO and Claudia had planned it together to help take some pressure off of the Cuba issue.)
Claudia is tired, gets four hours of sleep a night, works her ass off and yells at subordinates who don’t do what she wants. Yes to all. She’s a serious person and she knows the clock is ticking on her 6 years. As usual, a woman who does what men would do gets different press. I wrote about one time when she was caught yelling at some Morena Party legislators who weren’t doing their jobs, good for her.
Like the average WSJ and NYT piece about Mexico, former officials of the previous ruling party (PAN) are quoted without explaining who they are. I suggest pulling out the old Google when you read these pieces.
So now let’s talk about the two CIA agents who died in a car wreck in Chihuahua, where there have been developments since the WSJ piece was posted. The WSJ piece ended with what I think a lot of people believe — Claudia’s objection to the agents’ presence is Kabuki. This misunderstands just how touchy the Mexican public is about their sovereignty, and what a hot button political issue it is.
To review, unlike almost every other state in Mexico, the governor of the Chihuahua, Maru Campos, is a member of the PAN party, which is the conservative opposition to the ruling Morena party.
Chihuahua Governor Maria Eugenia [Maru] Campos
A total of four CIA agents were reportedly wearing uniforms of the Chihuahua State Investigative Agency when they participated in a raid on a meth lab run by the Jalisco cartel. César Jáuregui, the Attorney General of Chihuhua, resigned on Monday after being caught lying about the presence of the agents. Now, Campos is in the hot seat after refusing to appear before committees of the Mexican National Senate:
Morena Senator Óscar Cantón Zetina on Tuesday accused Chihuahua Governor Maru Campos of treason due to her government’s alleged approval of the participation of U.S. Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) personnel in a drug lab raid in the northern state earlier this month.
[…]
Senator Lucía Trasviña, president of the Public Security Committee, said Tuesday that the participation of U.S. personnel in the drug lab operation in Chihuahua amounted to a violation of national sovereignty. She accused Campos of disrespect for Mexico’s laws and said that her failure to appear in the Senate impeded accountability.
Senator Martha Lucía Mícher referred to the governor as “Lady CIA.” The terms “lady” and “lord” are used mockingly in Mexico to call out people — particularly the privileged — caught on video behaving arrogantly or abusively in public.
“We’re here to talk about Lady CIA,” Mícher said in an address to the Senate.
“About the lady who, in addition to not coming [to the Senate], … gives herself the luxury of violating Article 40 and other articles of the Constitution,” she said.
Article 40 of the Mexican Constitution states that “the people of Mexico, under no circumstance, will accept interventions, interference or any other act from abroad.”
(The Mexican Congress does not have subpoena powers, but they could impeach Campos.)
The liberal newspaper [really, not like the NYT] La Jornada has an editorial about this that includes more damning detail. The context is Governor Campos’ hurry-up appointment of Wendy Chávez Villanueva to head a commission to investigate the incident. Chávez Villanueva immediately blamed the director general of the Chihuahua investigative agency, who conveniently (for her purposes) died in the meth lab raid:
Besides the poor taste of blaming a dead person, Chávez Villanueva’s statements are patently false and attempt to portray as anecdotal what is systematic: the infiltration of U.S. forces into the Chihuahua government. In this regard, it should be recalled that the state’s Secretary of Public Security, Gilberto Loya Chávez, himself boasted that an entire floor of the agency’s headquarters is designated to serve as a bunker for agents belonging to the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration, as well as the Federal Bureau of Investigation, Customs and Border Protection, and Homeland Security Investigations, among others. Furthermore, Loya Chávez expressed his conviction that federal permits are not required “to cooperate with these agencies on a permanent basis,” which demonstrates a serious disregard for the letter of the Constitution and the Homeland Security Law.
So, clearly, there’s a problem in Chihuahua, and, clearly, the Morena Party and President Claudia Sheinbaum aren’t pretending there isn’t. This is what a scandal looks like in a functioning modern democracy. This isn’t a cover-up, and it isn’t Kabuki.
Finally, one more thing about that WSJ piece. It quoted unnamed insiders who said that Claudia is “indecisive". I don’t know exactly what that means, but by US standards, her administration accomplishes more in a week than the sclerotic US Presidency (of either party) does in a month or maybe 6 months. Perhaps “indecisive” means that she doesn’t careen around capriciously making “decisions” that can’t be implement, are illegal, or both. And leftists who are getting shit done are “boring” to the media —opening hospitals and railroad lines, effectively vaccinating the population, and traveling the country tirelessly to connect with the public aren’t nearly as fun as having a big circle-jerk press dinner.
The next challenge faced by Claudia’s government is yesterday’s US indictment of the Governor of Sinaloa, Rubén Rocha Moya, and eight others for drug trafficking and other offenses. Moya is a member of the Morena Party, so that’s a political problem. Since the Department of Justice is run by clowns, this will be yet another challenge for the Sheinbaum government, since on the one hand they want to battle corruption, and on the other hand, Todd Blanche. Claudia hasn’t commented on this extensively, but as the WSJ has told us, she gets up every weekday and has a two-hour press conference, so by sometime this morning, we’ll know her position.
If you want to hear the case for the indictment being the work of US Ambassador to Mexico Ron Johnson, former CIA, as part of an effort to pressure Mexico during the re-negotiation of the USMCA trade treaty, as well as another take on the WSJ piece, the English-language Soberanía podcast, hosted by two Mexican journalists, will give you that perspective.
Boring, dull, indecisive Claudia Sheinbaum publicizing the tedious, no fun Mexican health initiative of National Vaccination Week, which includes vaccinating all women 32-36 weeks pregnant for RSV. No raccoon penises were harvested at this event.
