🇺🇸🇲🇽 Drug war cooperation between the U.S. and Mexico is at its lowest point in decades.

“There’s really been minimal to nonexistent law enforcement cooperation,” said Vanda Felbab-Brown, a drug-trafficking expert and senior fellow at the Brookings Institution. “The Mexican government has not been allowing joint raids or even observation by U.S. law enforcement. Now this blatantly false statement by Mexico’s president.”

Matthew Donahue, who retired last year after three decades with the Drug Enforcement Administration, agreed that cooperation was “nonexistent” and added that the biggest problem is corruption in Mexico “and how it has infiltrated many levels of their government.”

“This is the worst it has ever been in Mexico,” he said. “What is frustrating is that we know where the traffickers are,” but the U.S. government has been unable to persuade Mexico to act, “so all that operational intelligence gathering is wasted.”

📎 NBC News