Menendez: Cartels Run the Border Communities, Not the Mexican Government

Senator Bob Menendez (D-NY) said Sunday on NBC’s “Meet the Press” that the border cities in Mexico were ran by the criminal cartels, not the government.

Anchor Chuck Todd said, “All right. Let me move to what happened to the four Americans this weekend. What did it expose which is the fact that this is an administration in Mexico that has chosen a different tact in dealing with the cartels meaning they don’t want to deal with them the way the previous administration did and they don’t seem to want to work with the United States and get our help with dealing with the cartels. How do you deal with this when you have a Mexican government that may not be on the same page?”

Menendez said, “This is one of our great challenges. President López Obrador talked about, when the took office, kisses and not bullets. That’s not working very well. It is the cartels that run the border communities, not the government of Mexico. Mexico has a responsibility, first and foremost to its own citizens to establish safety and security within its own territory and to those who visit its country, as well. So we need to up dramatically our engagement in Mexico and it can’t be about economics and it has to be about safety and security, as well. I am afraid that we are headed in the wrong direction on that and on democracy questions, as well. This is a present danger that we have to deal with and we have to engage the Mexicans in a way that says you have to do a lot more in your security. We can help them and we have intelligence and other information we can share, but we need them to enforce in their own country.”

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