The U.S. Treasury has already marked 31 targets in the State of Mexico. Now the lens moves up to the cabinet.
Fuel theft, chemicals from China, Tren de Aragua and La Familia: the full route of the mother of all battles of 2027

The State of Mexico has almost 17 million people and the largest voter roll in the country: 12,871,433 voters as of the INE cut of January 29, 2026. On June 6, 2027 it elects 75 state legislators, 125 municipal governments and 40 federal districts. That is 1,291 local offices in a single day. Whoever wins the State of Mexico wins the center of the country. That is why it is called the mother of all battles.

On September 29, 2026, The New York Times reported that two U.S. security agencies are reviewing allegations against Andrés Manuel López Beltrán over alleged ties to people linked to organized crime and fuel smuggling. No formal investigation is open and there are no charges. On October 5, political columns published in Mexico claimed that attention extends to two members of the State of Mexico cabinet: Horacio Duarte Olivares, Secretary of Government, and Óscar Flores Jiménez, Secretary of Finance. Those columns cite no documents. Here they are treated as what they are: allegations, not proof.

This investigation does not start from the columns. It starts from Washington's official files. I downloaded today the full list of the Treasury's Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) and searched, address by address, everything that falls inside the 125 municipalities of the State of Mexico. I crossed it with the state prosecutor's criminal map, with Pemex data on illegal pipeline taps, with seized drug labs and with Operation Enjambre. The result is a map no one had published in full.

Three levels, always separate. Fact: what an official document says. Source: who says it. Analysis: my reading. Every person named keeps the presumption of innocence without exception. A Treasury designation is an administrative measure of a foreign government, not a criminal conviction.

The State of Mexico leads the country in the crimes that measure territorial control by organized crime. In 2025 it had 2,257 extortion victims, 20.4% of the national total. As of August 27, 2026 it had 14,377 disappeared and missing persons, more than any other state. In the first half of 2026 it recorded 464 torture victims, more than Quintana Roo and Puebla combined.

And there is a number the government does not advertise. For 2025 the state prosecutor reported 1,575 victims of intentional homicide and femicide. INEGI, using death certificates, counted 2,575. That is a thousand dead of difference, a 63.5% gap, four times the national gap. With the INEGI figure, the State of Mexico is not the fifth most violent state in the country. It is the second.

This is the investigation's central original calculation. On October 10, 2026 I downloaded OFAC's SDN and address files (19,416 records). I filtered every address that falls in a State of Mexico municipality and discarded false positives, such as streets named Toluca or Texcoco in Tijuana and Monterrey. That leaves 31 people and companies.

Naucalpan has 7. Toluca, the state capital, 6. Huixquilucan, 6. Atizapán de Zaragoza, 5. Metepec, 4. Lerma, Tlatlaya, Cuautitlán Izcalli, Ecatepec and Tlalnepantla also appear. Eighteen are older Kingpin Act (SDNTK) records. The other thirteen are from 2023 onward. Ten were designated after February 20, 2025, the day Washington declared the cartels terrorist organizations.

There is a second cross-check no one has run. The Mexican CURP ID encodes the state of birth in positions 12 and 13. The Treasury list contains six people with a CURP showing birth in the State of Mexico. One of them, Areli Isis Medina Flores, is linked by OFAC to Audias Flores Silva, El Jardinero, of the CJNG. Another is Eliseo de León Becerra, majority shareholder of the Metepec chemical importer.

Use the map. Each layer is a different official file. Tap a municipality to see what is in it.

Since February 20, 2025 the Sinaloa Cartel, the CJNG, La Nueva Familia Michoacana and Tren de Aragua are foreign terrorist organizations for the United States. In the State of Mexico all four structures appear at once: three with companies on the Treasury list and the fourth with a base declared by the State Department.

Eight State of Mexico companies carry the SDGT label today, the global terrorism tag. For a U.S. bank, any transaction with them is a violation. For anyone who knowingly provides them services after the organization behind them was designated, the offense is material support to terrorism.

Metepec is the municipality fused with Toluca, the seat of the state government. Four of the 31 targets are registered there. Together they describe two businesses Washington considers strategic for the cartels: chemicals and fuel.

Chemicals. On July 12, 2023 Treasury designated REI Compañía Internacional, S.A. de C.V., an import-export company. Official text: "Based in Metepec, Estado de Mexico, REI Compania Internacional regularly receives chemical shipments from exporters in the People's Republic of China." It also designated its majority shareholder, Eliseo de León Becerra, born in Toluca. The action targeted precursor suppliers that, according to Treasury, operate under the Los Chapitos faction of the Sinaloa Cartel.

Fuel. On June 30, 2026 Treasury designated Jomadi Logistics and Cargo and Ahavat Logistics Solution, both registered in Metepec, for supporting the CJNG in smuggling fuel from the United States into Mexico. According to Treasury, they moved tens of millions of dollars through the U.S. financial system with third parties linked to the CJNG. That same day FinCEN issued an alert to banks on fiscal fuel theft. Jomadi holds marketing permit H/19387/COM/2016. Ahavat, H/23558/COM/2020. As of July 2, 2026 Ahavat still appeared in official supplier registries.

The link to New York. Mexicanos Contra la Corrupción y la Impunidad documented three transfers to Ahavat totaling 678,900 pesos between April 4 and 23, 2024. They came from an account of Preecasin, the construction company owned by the Sinaloa government led by Rubén Rocha Moya, recorded as "invoice payment" with no service specified. Ahavat is not on Sinaloa's supplier registry. Rocha Moya has been charged since April 29, 2026 in the Southern District of New York, case S9 23 Cr. 180 (KPF). In other words: the Metepec company that Treasury links to the CJNG received money from the government of a governor now charged in the United States. Level: documented by MCCI with internal accounting records.

Illegal taps on Pemex pipelines in the State of Mexico fell from 1,182 in 2023 to 547 in 2024 and 507 in 2025. The government presented it as a success. In 2026 the curve turned: from January to April there were 329 taps, 67.86% more than the same period of 2025. If the pace of those four months holds, 2026 would close near 987 taps, almost double 2025. That projection is linear and my own, not official data.

LP gas theft nearly tripled in 2025: 252 taps, second place nationally. The municipalities with the most gasoline and diesel taps follow the Tuxpan-Azcapotzalco pipeline: Axapusco 177, Huehuetoca 117, Otumba 74. LP gas taps are in the north: Nextlalpan 81, Tepetlaoxtoc 56, Polotitlán 46. And the State of Mexico has more gas station permits than any other state: 1,287 in September 2025.

There are two kinds of fuel theft. The low one drills pipelines. The high one enters through customs with lubricant paperwork and is sold as fuel without paying taxes. That is fiscal fuel theft, huachicol fiscal, and it is the one Washington is watching. This is the route, built only from what official documents and public case files say.

On June 20, 2024 Treasury wrote that La Nueva Familia Michoacana produces fentanyl in "Tejupilco, Arcelia, Cuernavaca, Culiacan, Guadalajara, and Toluca." Two of those six cities are in the State of Mexico, and one is the state capital. On July 23, 2024 it designated Fornely Lab, registered in Naucalpan, as owned by Gerardo Rivera Ibarra, leader of a CJNG cell able to supply fentanyl, methamphetamine and cocaine to the United States.

On the ground there are seized labs less than 80 kilometers from Mexico City. In Ixtlahuaca, on March 12, 2025, the Navy seized 70 kilos of synthetic drugs and more than 11,000 liters of chemicals. In Chalco, in July 2025, a lab came to light after an explosion, and state authorities tied it to a Jalisco-origin group. In Soyaniquilpan, in September 2024, to a Sinaloa-origin group. In February 2026 the FGR destroyed 18.9 tons and 78,533 liters of precursors from Sinaloa cases at facilities in the State of Mexico. And on September 11, 2026 customs at Toluca airport detected 10.69 kilos of liquid methamphetamine.

What does not exist is an official count of labs by state. The federal government reports more than 2,700 dismantled since October 2024, but does not publish how many are in the State of Mexico. It is one of the questions this complaint asks to answer.

On April 15, 2025 the State Department offered up to $5 million for Johnny Hurtado Olascoaga, El Pez, and up to $3 million for José Alfredo Hurtado Olascoaga, El Fresa. It was the first reward for leaders of a cartel designated a terrorist organization. The notice describes La Nueva Familia Michoacana as an organization "based in the State of Mexico, and parts of Michoacán and Guerrero." The brothers are indicted in the Northern District of Georgia.

The state prosecutor's map places La Familia in 26 municipalities in the south and west. Own calculation on the official geometry: those 26 municipalities are 42.4% of the state's territory and have 2.36 million residents. In July 2025, Operation Liberación found La Familia controlled the price of cement, rebar, chicken and beef in 14 municipalities. Beef cost up to 47% more.

Operation Enjambre began in the State of Mexico on November 22, 2024. As of October 9, 2026 it has 27 people sentenced in the state, with more than 1,200 years in prison. The former mayor of Amanalco was sentenced to 70 years on December 16, 2025 for a double homicide that, according to prosecutors, she ordered with members of La Familia. According to the same prosecutors, the Amanalco council paid the group up to 100,000 pesos per council decision and handed over half the annual budget.

The fact that touches the United States. In Santo Tomás de los Plátanos, according to prosecutors, municipal officials gave La Familia the property registry and social program rolls to locate families with relatives in the United States and charge them a recurring fee on remittances. In other words, part of the money that workers send from the United States ended up in the hands of an organization that is now a terrorist group for Washington. The documented events are from 2022 to 2024, before the designation. They serve as background and as a typology for FinCEN.

On September 30, 2026, ten days ago, Treasury designated the Tren de Aragua financial network behind ATM jackpotting attacks in the United States: $40.73 million in losses across more than 1,500 attacks. Two of the designated companies are in the State of Mexico. Soluciones Integrales Toluca, S.A. de C.V., linked to Alejandro Mejía Castillo, a Mexican national. Enigma Community, S. de R.L. de C.V., registered in Tlalnepantla de Baz, incorporated on June 26, 2024 and linked to Óscar Leonardo Martínez Pirona, a Venezuelan national. The network's leader, Prometheus, appeared in court in Omaha on October 2, 2026.

In human trafficking, the State of Mexico ranks second nationally: 44 victims in the first half of 2026, 15 of them for sexual exploitation, and 41 case files. But the State Department's annual trafficking report published in 2025 contains a sentence that should embarrass the state government: "The State of Mexico did not report any investigations" in 2024, after leading all states in investigations in 2023.

This chapter strictly separates what is proven from what is alleged. No person in this diagram is charged in the United States or designated by Treasury. Tap each node to see the card. Color indicates level: A public record, B official document naming the person, C documented by an organization or sourced press, D column allegation without a document.

The link no one has drawn. Cristóbal Castañeda Camarillo has been the State of Mexico's Secretary of Security since June 17, 2024. Before that he was Sinaloa's Secretary of Public Security from 2018 to August 2023, the last two years under Rocha Moya. The New York indictment describes events from the 2021 election onward, when Castañeda held the post. His successor as head of that department, Gerardo Mérida Sánchez, is charged in the same case and surrendered on May 11, 2026. Castañeda is not charged and does not appear in the indictment. But he is the State of Mexico official with the most direct knowledge of the security apparatus New York describes, which makes him a person of interest to any prosecutor.

In the 2024 Public Accounts, the federal Superior Audit Office flagged more than 6.018 billion pesos at the State of Mexico government and probable damage of more than 356 million, first among state governments by amount flagged. At the Finance Department it flagged payroll withholdings of 2.16 billion pesos from 53,671 workers. That account covers only six weeks of Óscar Flores's tenure, which began on November 20, 2024.

State debt stood at 61.428 billion pesos in the first quarter of 2025, the third highest in the country. In education, state prosecutors brought 26 people to trial over the sale of teaching posts: 459 irregular hires and damage of more than 96 million pesos between January 2025 and February 2026. The main detainee was a former deputy secretary of the previous administration.

And there is a precedent that does not go away. When Governor Delfina Gómez was mayor of Texcoco, about 550 municipal workers had 10% of their salary withheld between 2013 and 2015. The INE fined Morena 4,529,225 pesos on September 3, 2021 and the Electoral Tribunal unanimously upheld the sanction on January 12, 2022. Horacio Duarte was mayor of Texcoco from 2000 to 2003.

This is the calculation that turns the criminal map into an electoral map. I took the 35 municipalities where the state prosecutor's official map places La Familia, the CJNG, the Unión Tepito or one of their local groups, and crossed them with INEGI's 2020 census. 8,694,095 people live there: 51.2% of the state. Applied proportionally to the voter roll, that is about 6.6 million voters. It is an estimate, not INE data.

Adding up all the layers of this investigation, Treasury targets, fuel theft, labs, Enjambre and trafficking, gives 63 municipalities with 12.46 million residents: 73.3% of the state. Morena opened registration for its municipal coordinators from October 8 to 18, 2026 and will decide by December 31. The 2027 candidacies are being decided now, on top of this map.

For Washington, the risk is concrete. If a single 2027 campaign takes money from a designated organization, that money meets the definition of material support to terrorism. And U.S. banks processing payments for those campaigns are exposed.

Since March 31, 2025, Treasury designated ten State of Mexico companies in four separate actions. But on October 5, 2026, in its third round of list "modernization" removals, it dropped at least four Kingpin-era records with State of Mexico ties: Consultoría en Cambios Falcón, a currency exchange in Interlomas, Huixquilucan; Aeronáutica Cóndor, with hangars at Toluca airport; Grupo Guadalest and Omar Alfredo Jácome del Valle, El Piolo. A removal is not a declaration of innocence. But it changes the map: Washington clears the old and marks the new.

This is analysis and an educational tool, not a determination of guilt. Each door shows which law applies, to which facts of this investigation, and before whom.

The formal complaint, in court format, is filed with the Department of Justice, Treasury, FinCEN, Homeland Security Investigations and the State Department. It asks for twelve concrete things: