The Biden administration on Wednesday sanctioned a network of Sinaloa Cartel members and associated entities for their involvement in the illegal and deadly fentanyl and methamphetamine trade, providing chemicals to “super labs” that produce illicit drugs for the cartel once run by the notorious drug lord Joaquin “El Chapo” Guzmán.
In addition to sanctioning the two brothers running the network – Ludim Zamudio Lerma and Luis Alfonso Zamudio Lerma – the US Treasury also designated four other Mexican nationals and Sinaloa Cartel members as well as six Mexico-based companies.
“The Zamudio Lerma brothers and their network enable the production of synthetic drugs that devastate American lives, while lining the pockets of Sinaloa Cartel leadership,” said Andrea Gacki, director of the Office of Foreign Assets Control at Treasury. “Depriving this network of access and resources will hinder the Sinaloa Cartel’s ability to produce and traffic the illicit drugs it depends on.”
The action Wednesday was “coordinated closely” with Mexican authorities and is part of a government-wide effort to curb the trafficking of drugs that kill thousands of Americans every year, according to a Treasury news release.
The other sanctioned members of the notorious cartel include Ludim Zamudio Lerma’s son, Ludim Zamudio Ibarra, and Luis Gerardo Flores Madrid for supplying illegal “precursor” chemicals known to be used in manufacturing illicit drugs, as well as two lab operators: Ernesto Machado Torres and Jose Santana Arredondo Beltran, according to the Treasury.
The six companies sanctioned Wednesday are owned or controlled by the Zamudio family and include two companies involved in – or likely involved in – the drug trade as well as two real estate businesses and two import-export businesses.
“Drug trafficking drives instability, fuels corruption and kills young and old. This crisis cuts across every geographic, demographic and economic category in our nation, damaging our prosperity and imposing tremendous suffering on our communities. The production and trafficking of these drugs is a global problem, and the United States is prepared to lead at a global level,” Secretary of State Antony Blinken said in a statement.
While China was the primary source of illicit fentanyl in the US before 2019, patterns changed after the Chinese imposed stricter controls on the drug trade, according to the Congressional Research Service. Since then, Mexico-based organizations – like the Sinaloa Cartel – source precursor chemicals from China to then produce the illicit drugs in Mexican labs before shipping them into the US.
The US government has previously sanctioned cartel members as well as logistical allies used to funnel illicit drugs into the United States, taking action as recently as last month to sanction fentanyl traffickers fueling the US opioid crisis.
The move by Treasury comes after President Joe Biden promised “strong penalties to crack down on fentanyl trafficking” in his State of the Union address earlier this month, and as many Republicans criticize the administration for not doing more to stem the flow of the deadly drugs.