When the Mexican drug kingpin Ismael Zambada García was sentenced to life in prison in a New York courtroom last week, he delivered a message that many Mexican officials found uncomfortable to hear.
Reading his guilty plea aloud, the man known as El Mayo said he had operated freely inside Mexico for years by bribing politicians, the police and the military.
It was not exactly a bombshell — it is well known that Mexican cartels have long thrived by paying off officials. But it underscored a growing problem for President Claudia Sheinbaum of Mexico, who has been under intense pressure from the White House to do more to root out corruption.
For months, Ms. Sheinbaum has tried to manage two complex relationships at the same time: Mexico’s with the United States and her own with her powerful party at home. She has repeatedly said, in essence, that she wants to work with President Trump — but not take orders from him.
She will try to walk that tightrope again in Mexico City on Wednesday, when she meets with Secretary of State Marco Rubio to discuss how to battle the drug cartels.
Mr. Rubio has been one of the U.S. officials highlighting the problem of criminal groups’ power, telling Fox News in March that “in many cases, cooperation is hindered by the dangerous levels of corruption and influence over the judiciary.”
Mr. Trump has made similar remarks, saying in July that the Mexican authorities are “petrified to go to work because the cartels have a tremendous grip on Mexico and the politicians and the people that get elected.”
Ms. Sheinbaum has cracked down on a powerful cartel, transferred dozens of prisoners to the United States and noted major drug seizures at the border.
The situation, nevertheless, has still squeezed her into a precarious position.
Mr. Trump has threatened devastating tariffs and even military operations if she does not take aggressive action to halt the flow of fentanyl across the border.
Yet, Mexico’s web of political alliances and interests require her to tread lightly — particularly in going after fellow politicians — or risk blowback that could threaten her control of her leftist party, Morena, according to Mexican political and security analysts.
“She is stuck between the rock of Trump’s pressures and the hard place of Mexican narco-politics,” said Carlos Bravo Regidor, a Mexican political analyst.
Ms. Sheinbaum has said that she hopes to announce a new security framework for Mexico and the United States to work together, yet the details of any agreement are expected to be relatively vague.
At the request of Ms. Sheinbaum, it is likely to include language that Mexico’s sovereignty be respected, according to a person close to the Mexican government who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss private plans.
The sovereignty issue has become a particularly sensitive topic in Mexico, as Mr. Trump has deployed thousands of troops to the southern border and directed the Pentagon to explore military operations against cartels he has designated terrorist organizations.
The issue has become so fraught that it caused a near brawl in Mexico’s Senate last week, when Senator Alejandro Moreno, an opposition leader known as Alito, became furious that he did not get a chance to speak during a debate about potential U.S. military intervention. He shoved and swung at a powerful senator from Ms. Sheinbaum’s political party, and pushed over another man, videos showed.
Any security agreement that might be unveiled on Wednesday is not expected to include mention of efforts to go after corrupt Mexican officials, and the White House has not sent a list of Mexican politicians it believes are linked to the cartels, according to the person close to the Mexican government.
But the Trump administration has repeatedly made clear in public that it wants more action on the issue.
Security analysts say that the cartels have deep influence over the government in many areas of Mexico. They also say that because of the recent dominance of Ms. Sheinbaum’s party — Morena and its allies effectively control all three federal branches of government — there are likely links between the cartels and some members of Morena and allied politicians.
Going after those politicians could fracture Morena’s delicate alliances and jeopardize Ms. Sheinbaum politically. That is especially true, analysts said, because many of the alliances were built by Andrés Manuel López Obrador, the former president who handpicked her as his successor.
“She has a dilemma that consists of either giving in to U.S. pressure or investigating some members close to her political benefactor’s circle,” said Eduardo Guerrero, a former Mexican security official who now studies cartels and their influence.
Carlos Heredia, a left-leaning former Mexican governor and member of Congress, said that so far, Ms. Sheinbaum has been unwilling to remove any high-ranking official appointed by Mr. López Obrador.
“The biggest challenge for her comes from the inside,” he said, “how she deals with the legacy that she inherited, of a circle of people that were protected from the highest office, and I’m thinking of governors, lawmakers and even people in the cabinet.”
Ms. Sheinbaum has strongly denied any notion that her government harbors corrupt politicians or has gone easy on them. For instance, she has discussed an investigation into bribery at the state oil company. One operation her government has helped carry out against extortion has netted about 60 local officials accused of ties to cartels.
During her first 11 months in office, the Mexican authorities have arrested nearly 31,000 people with suspected connections to organized crime, about 16 times the rate of her predecessor’s tenure, according to government data.
Yet, of the publicly known arrests, no federal officials have been detained so far.
She has also stressed that a politician is not corrupt simply because of accusations. That has been her stance on one of Morena’s leaders of the Mexican Senate, Adán Augusto López Hernández, a former interior minister under Mr. López Obrador.
Mr. López is caught in a scandal because two men he hired as his security chiefs years ago were recently accused of leading a cartel. Mr. López has not been charged with any crime, and Morena and Ms. Sheinbaum have backed him.
“We are not going to cover for anyone, absolutely no one,” Ms. Sheinbaum said recently. “But everyone has their information, and everyone has the right to put forth — as Senator Adán Augusto has said — their side of the story.”
In recent months, the U.S. government has revoked the visas of at least one prominent Morena member in Mexico, a governor, and two other politicians. U.S. officials have declined to say why, but a cloud of suspicion has fallen on the officials.
Separately, Rubén Rocha Moya, the governor of Sinaloa, the violence-stricken state home to the powerful cartel of the same name, has been especially dogged by accusations of corruption. He has denied any wrongdoing and retains Morena’s backing. His office did not respond to a request for comment.
While engulfed in a news media firestorm this year that he had been bought off by cartels, Mr. Rocha received an important visit. Andrés Manuel López Beltrán, the former president’s son and a senior Morena official, posed for a photo with the embattled politician as he delivered a Morena identification card..
Cyntia Barrera Diaz and Emiliano Rodríguez Mega contributed reporting.
Jack Nicas is The Times’s Mexico City bureau chief, leading coverage of Mexico, Central America and the Caribbean.
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