Bill would designate Mexican cartels as 'terrorist' groups

WASHINGTON — In a potential escalation of the U.S. attack on Mexican drug cartels, Rep. Michael McCaul, R-Texas, introduced legislation Wednesday to designate six Mexican drug cartels as "foreign terrorist organizations" — a designation that could expose Mexican drug traffickers and U.S. gun runners to charges of supporting terrorism.

McCaul, a former federal prosecutor and ex-deputy attorney general of Texas, unveiled his legislation targeting the Arellano Feliz Organization, Los Zetas, the Beltran Leyva Organization, LaFamilia Michoacana, the Sinaloa Cartel and the Gulf Cartel as his House Homeland Security subcommittee prepares for hearings designed to elicit support for the proposal from four high level Obama administration officials.

Cartels have used violence to seize political and economic control over parts of northern Mexico, with spill-over crime resulting "in the abandonment of property and loss of security on the U.S. side of the border," declared McCaul, chairman of the Homeland Security Committee's panel on oversight and investigations. "Mexican drug cartels are terrorist organizations and this designation will provide the necessary tools to effectively advance the national security interests of both Mexico and the United States."

McCaul spokesman Mike Rosen said it was the first time that a member of Congress had proposed the designation for the powerful Mexican drug gangs that have waged war against Mexican security forces over the last five years, claiming nearly 35,000 lives.

If adopted by the GOP-led House, the Democratic-led Senate and signed into law by President Obama, McCaul's proposal would enable prosecutors to seek up to 15 additional years in prison for each conviction of providing "material support or resources" to the six designated cartels. The legislation also would empower prosecutors to seek the death penalty in cases were a cartel member committed murder in the course of drug trafficking.

Mexican drug cartels may not be "driven by religious ideology" that propels al-Qaida, the Taliban or Hezbollah, McCaul said. But the Mexican gangs are "using similar tactics to gain political and economic influence," relying on "kidnappings, political assassinations, attacks on civilian and military targets, taking over cities and even putting up checkpoints in order to control territory and institutions."

The proposed designation could become a powerful political weapon in the ongoing partisan struggle over whether the U.S.-Mexico border has been adequately secured against threats to national security.