The U.S. government has designated two additional Mexican cartels as foreign terrorist organizations, including one with a significant presence along the U.S. border with Texas. The Juárez Cartel, which controls a key crossing point in Ciudad Juárez opposite El Paso, Texas, and Los Viagras, a criminal group from the western state of Michoacán, were formally named in the Federal Register on Thursday, July 16, 2026, at 1:07 PM EDT.
These groups now join six other Mexican criminal organizations previously designated as terrorist groups by the U.S., such as the Sinaloa Cartel and the Jalisco New Generation Cartel. The Trump administration began extending this designation to Latin American cartels in February 2025, aiming to empower U.S. authorities to take more aggressive actions against them and their supporters. This strategy has been accompanied by U.S. military strikes against suspected drug trafficking vessels in Latin American waters, which have resulted in over 200 fatalities since September.
Secretary of State Marco Rubio stated that both the Juárez Cartel and Los Viagras have either committed terrorist acts or pose a substantial risk of engaging in activities that threaten the security of U.S. nationals, or the national security, foreign policy, or economy of the United States. This move intensifies pressure on Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum's administration, particularly following the recent indictment of 10 current and former officials from the state of Sinaloa for alleged ties to the Sinaloa Cartel and ongoing controversies surrounding U.S. operations within Mexico.
The Juárez Cartel is recognized as one of Mexico's oldest drug trafficking organizations. For decades, it has maintained control over the vital drug smuggling route through Ciudad Juárez. Its founder, Amado Carrillo Fuentes, known as "El Señor de los Cielos" for his extensive use of aircraft in the 1990s, along with his successors, built a multi-million dollar enterprise from trafficking vast quantities of drugs. Despite numerous arrests of its leaders, the cartel and its affiliates have sustained their infrastructure for smuggling illegal goods into the U.S. The organization was notably accused in the 2019 killings of nine American women and children from an offshoot Mormon community.
According to Mexican analyst David Saucedo, this designation is crucial for enabling more decisive U.S. actions along the border. He noted that two other groups, the Gulf Cartel and the Northeast Cartel, both located at the eastern end of the Texas border, were already declared terrorist organizations in February 2025. Saucedo highlighted that the Juárez Cartel's designation is key to bolstering border security efforts.
Los Viagras operates as a local cartel in Michoacán, a state already home to designated terrorist groups like Cárteles Unidos and La Nueva Familia Michoacana. Los Viagras emerged after a farmer-led uprising in 2013–2014 displaced older cartels, only for new ones to take their place. Earlier this year, an alleged associate of Los Viagras, known as "El Botox," was arrested in connection with the murder of a prominent leader of the state's lime growers.
The cartel is led by Nicolás Sierra Santana, alias "El Gordo," who faces a formal indictment in the District of Columbia for drug trafficking conspiracy, filed in June 2025. The State Department is offering a $5 million reward for information leading to his capture. The group has strategically shifted its alliances to solidify its regional territorial control through extortion and has also become involved in the production of synthetic drugs, which are then sold to other cartels for trafficking into the U.S.
In 2024, prosecutors reported that Los Viagras established makeshift internet antennas in various towns, demanding payment from locals for Wi-Fi access under threat of death. These systems, dubbed "narco-antennas" by local media, were constructed using stolen equipment.
