WASHINGTON — The US Treasury sanctioned senior members of a vicious Mexican drug cartel Wednesday for trafficking fentanyl into the US — as well as a notorious rapper thought to be providing up to half of his royalties to the gangsters.
The Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control announced the crippling penalties for Cartel del Noreste — among the most violent drug runners in Mexico, a dangerous presence on both sides of the border near Laredo, Texas, and a US-designated foreign terror organization.
Rapper Ricardo Hernandez Medrano — who goes by the stage names “El Makabelico” and “Comando Exclusivo,” was hit with sanctions as an associate of the cartel after having forked over 50% of his streaming cash, believed to be thousands of dollars, to fund trafficking, human smuggling and extortion.
Medrano boasts nearly 2.8 million subscribers on YouTube, along with 1.3 million followers on TikTok and one million followers on Instagram.
Three other top Cartel del Noreste members — Abdon Federico Rodriguez Garcia, Antonio Romero Sanchez and Francisco Daniel Esqueda Nieto — were also sanctioned.
Rodriguez, also known by the street name “Cucho,” engaged in “drug trafficking, money laundering, fuel theft, and extortion,” according to the Treasury. Rodriguez is a longstanding member of the group, having been arrested in 2013.
Romero, also known as “Romeo,” is described as a violent fugitive connected to beheadings and executions in addition to the assassination attempt of a government official in the state of Nuevo Laredo.
Esqueda, known as “Franky Esqueda,” assumed control of the cartel in that area, assaulting a Mexican army official and leading an attack on a government helicopter earlier this year during the hunt for cartel kingpin Ricardo Gonzalez Sauceda, who was arrested in February.
“Under President Trump, the Treasury Department will continue to be relentless in its effort to put America First by targeting terrorist drug cartels,” said Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent in a statement. “These cartels poison Americans with fentanyl and conduct human smuggling operations along our southwest border.”
“Treasury, in close coordination with our law enforcement partners, is committed to a full-frontal assault on the cartels, targeting the leadership and revenue streams that enable their horrific crimes,” he added.
The sanctions will block the cartel leaders and associates from any property or interests in the US or under the control of American persons, as well as entities in which they have a majority stake.
Bessent has targeted many criminal networks for flooding the US with fentanyl since taking office, often remarking that the issue is “personal” for him, since he’s known families who lost children to overdoses due to the crisis.
