The Trump administration’s Treasury Department announced today that it is imposing sanctions aimed at wiping out funding for the Sinaloa Cartel, a violent and notorious drug cartel that was recently designated as a foreign terror organization.
“We’ve taken decisive action against the Sinaloa Cartel, one of the most notoriously violent criminal and drug trafficking organizations in the world,” Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said in an announcement posted to X on Monday. “We leveled sanctions against six individuals and seven entities involved in a money laundering operation, cutting off financing for these evil people.”
National security is economic security. Today, the @USTreasury Department proudly leveled new sanctions against financiers of the criminal Sinaloa drug cartel, which has flooded our borders with fentanyl and senselessly murdered innocent American citizens. This ends under… pic.twitter.com/b4uLng8RNN
— Secretary of Treasury Scott Bessent (@SecScottBessent) March 31, 2025
“The Sinaloa Cartel has invaded our southern border. They have tortured and murdered countless of our citizens, dedicated law enforcement agents like Kiki Camarena and veterans like Nicholas Quets, who was only 31 years old when he was ruthlessly taken from us,” Bessent went on to charge.
Bessent added that the foreign terror organization is responsible for a “significant amount of the fentanyl and illicit drugs brought into the United States,” adding that those drugs “continue to kill innocent Americans and destroy families every single day.”
“Laundered drug money is the lifeblood of the Sinaloa Cartel’s narco-terrorist enterprise, only made possible through trusted financial facilitators like those we have designated today,” the Treasury Secretary also noted.
The Treasury Department spotlighted the specific individuals and organizations hit by the sanctions, also explaining that any of their assets held in institutions in the United States are now required to be frozen and reported to the Office of Foreign Assets Control.
The sanctions come just after the Trump administration’s State Department named the Sinaloa Cartel a foreign terror organization, describing it as “one of the world’s most powerful drug cartels” and “one of the largest producers and traffickers of fentanyl and other illicit drugs to the United States.”
“Cartel de Sinaloa has used violence to murder, kidnap, and intimidate civilians, government officials, and journalists,” the State Department added.
Various different agencies in the Trump administration have recently taken action to crack down on the cartels. FBI Director Kash Patel announced earlier this month that the federal law enforcement agency had extradited a leader of the violent criminal gang MS-13 from Mexico.
The administration has also invoked the Alien Enemies Act to expedite the removal of suspected Tren de Aragua members. Multiple left-wing judges, including one who donated five figures to Democrats, have ruled against the use of the act to remove the illegal aliens, prompting the Trump administration to call for the Supreme Court to weigh in.
