Texas DPS urges spring breakers to avoid Mexico because of drug cartel violence

 In light of the continued drug cartel violence raging in Mexico , particularly the border areas, the Texas Department of Public Safety has put out an advisory urging folks to think twice before heading across the Rio Grande to whoop it up on Spring Break.

Trahan: http://dallasne.ws/hYaD5h

Rick Perry open to sending the US military into Mexico

Gov. Rick Perry says he's open to the idea of sending U.S. troops into Mexico to fight the drug war. The Texas governor told MSNBC this morning that border violence has escalated dramatically since George W. Bush was governor a decade ago. He said more aggressive federal tactics are needed. "You have a situation on the border where American citizens are being killed, and you didn't see that back when George Bush was the governor," he said.

Slater: http://dallasne.ws/dfa33M

Mexican officials capture much-wanted drug-trafficking suspect

La Barbie captured. Corchado and Villagran report:

MEXICO CITY – Texas-born suspected drug trafficker Edgar Valdez Villarreal, whose brutality belied his nickname "La Barbie," was captured Monday by Mexican federal authorities, the latest in a series of victories for the government in its fight against drug cartels. Valdez is considered the most wanted and highest-ranking U.S. drug trafficking suspect operating in Mexico. He also faces U.S. charges.
http://dallasne.ws/dC7TTC

On the Border/ The American Journalism Review

Despite the danger, the Dallas Morning News’ Alfredo Corchado investigates violence and corruption along the border between the United States and Mexico. http://ajr.org/Article.asp?id=4890

By Karen Carmichael

Karen Carmichael is an AJR editorial assistant.

Felipe Calderón's U.S. visit could shed light on joint fight against drug cartels

Gillman reports from DC:

WASHINGTON – President Barack Obama shuns talk of a "war on drugs." But when he welcomes Mexican President Felipe Calderón to the White House today, that nation's bloody fight with drug cartels – and its implications for U.S. security and immigration policy – will be a top agenda item.

The meeting comes as U.S. policymakers reassess the long-standing fight against the drug trade. Last week, with the death toll from Calderón's 3-year-old crackdown surpassing 23,000, Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton said the brutality and barbarism in Mexico was "just beyond imagination."
http://tinyurl.com/2dk3u5v

Texas senators stress need to stop Mexican violence from spreading to U.S.

Tom Benning reports:

WASHINGTON – Texas Sens. John Cornyn and Kay Bailey Hutchison pressed for more federal action Wednesday in securing the Mexican border and preventing violence from spilling over into the United States.
http://tinyurl.com/29omxf8

Texas border towns fear violent spillover from Mexico

Alfredo Corchado in our Mexico City bureau reports:

EL PASO – Texas law enforcement officials are bracing for a bloody weekend along the border, advising farmers to arm themselves as signs across northern Mexico point to a new escalation of violence after coordinated drug cartel attacks against the military this week.


In the northern Mexican states of Nuevo León and Tamaulipas, both bordering Texas, drug cartel gunmen used trucks and buses Tuesday to block approaches to military bases in Reynosa and Matamoros, apparently in an attempt to trap the troops inside. In all, gunmen attacked military targets in a half-dozen towns in the two states.

At least 18 suspected attackers were reported killed. One soldier was reported wounded.
(note: other reports have it as a toe injuty -- jj)

Fear now a way of life in border towns

The AP's Paul Weber reports:

FORT HANCOCK, Texas (AP) – Fear has settled over this border town of 1,700, about 50 miles southeast of Ciudad Juárez, Mexico, epicenter of that country's bloody drug war.


School enrollment in Fort Hancock, Texas, which is about 50 miles from Ciudad Juárez, Mexico, has been growing as more people flee the drug gang violence. Mexican families fleeing the violence have moved here or just sent their children, and authorities and residents say gangsters have followed them across the Rio Grande to apply terrifying, though so far subtle, intimidation.

Mexico, U.S. working together to battle drug cartels

Murder of 3 with US consulate ties prompts heightened activity. Gillman reports:

WASHINGTON – Drug cartels have expanded their war for control of Mexico faster than the U.S. has been able to pump in aid.


In the time needed for roughly 18,000 Mexicans to die in the violence raging just south of the Rio Grande, the United States has delivered about a fifth of the $1.3 billion promised in late 2007 under a security pact known as the Mérida Initiative.

White, Perry camps spar over border security

Hoppe reports:



AUSTIN – Democrat Bill White pressed for help with federal border security in a call to U.S. Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano, and he said Thursday that Republican Rick Perry, the governor he is challenging, also should have picked up the phone.

Texas senators invite Obama to US-Mexico border and urge action in drug-war violence

Texas Sens. John Cornyn and Kay Bailey Hutchison invited President Obama today to join them "soon" in a visit to the U.S.-Mexico border. "Such a visit would draw national attention to a national priority," they wrote, in a letter released by Cornyn's office. Gillman reports.

Fighting Cartels on the Camino Real Corridor/Merida II

See the original .pdf here. -- jj

Texas State Senator Shapleigh's letter on the volatile and violent border situation:
I write to update you on the situation in Juarez. Over the last few weeks, approximately 250 experts from Washington, D.C. and Mexico, D.F. representing a dozen agencies have been on the ground in Juarez, San Diego, Tijuana and other Border communities on a fact-finding mission to inform a policy review and assessment of the fundamental policy changes critical to US-Mexico bilateral relations.

Their basic plan is to frame Merida II around four key policy objectives: federal security, local/state security, jobs, and socioeconomic concerns. Key interest groups here and in Mexico want to broaden the policy discussion further to include the trillion-dollar annual (and growing) demand for drugs in the United States.

U.S. agencies join Mexico's inquiry into killings of 3 tied to American Consulate

Alfredo Corchado reports on heightened US involvement following slaying of consulate worker, 2 others in Ciudad Juárez:

MEXICO CITY – Teams of U.S. and Mexican agents on Monday poured into the grim streets of Ciudad Juárez, following leads in the murder of an American consulate worker, her husband and another Mexican acquaintance, amid vows that the killings will not go unpunished as so many thousands of others have in Mexico's widening drug war.

Obama condemns U.S. consulate killings in Mexico

MEXICO CITY — Mexican drug cartel enforcers are being blamed for the weekend gang-style slayings in Ciudad Juárez of an American Consulate office worker, her American husband and a Mexican employee of the consulate office, an outbreak of violence President Barack Obama called an outrage. Alfredo Corchado reports from Mexico.