MEXICO CITY (AP) \u2014 The embattled governor of Mexico\u2019s Sinaloa state has reversed his decision to return to his post, bowing to an extraordinary backlash from his own ruling party over accusations by U.S. prosecutors he conspired with a powerful cartel to smuggle drugs into the United States.<\/p>\n
State lawmakers were expected Sunday to approve Gov. Rub\u00e9n Rocha Moya\u2019s request for an indefinite leave of absence, about a day and a half after he announced his return by claiming Mexican prosecutors had cleared him of the drug trafficking charges leveled against him by the U.S. Department of Justice in late April.<\/p>\n
The rapid reversal demonstrated the authority Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum wields over her Morena party as she walks a fine line between placating U.S. President Donald Trump, who says cartels control Mexico and has repeatedly offered U.S. military help to fight them, and her progressive movement deeply wary of U.S. intervention.<\/p>\n
After nearly four months on leave, Rocha Moya announced Friday that he was returning to office, claiming Mexico\u2019s Attorney General\u2019s Office had found \u201cno evidence to support our participation in any criminal conduct.\u201d He declared that he was back \u201cas governor of Sinaloa with my head held high.\u201d<\/p>\n
That defiance lasted barely a day, as his return unleashed a torrent of criticism from governors, senators and other prominent figures in Morena, including Sheinbaum.<\/p>\n
\u201cNo personal interest can ever come before the interests of the people and the nation,\u201d she wrote Saturday in an apparent rebuke of Rocha Moya, without mentioning him by name. \u201cMexico deserves public servants who understand that positions are temporary, but responsibility to the nation is eternal.\u201d<\/p>\n
Morena said its national leadership had no prior knowledge of Rocha Moya\u2019s return, calling it his \u201cpersonal decision.\u201d The party\u2019s Senate bloc urged respect for the ongoing investigation, while Morena governors declared in a joint statement that \u201cpersonal or group political projects have no place\u201d when the country\u2019s interests are at stake.<\/p>\n
Ricardo Monreal, Morena\u2019s leader in the lower house of Congress, publicly urged Rocha Moya, his longtime ally, to reconsider and remain on leave.<\/p>\n
The coordinated response left Rocha Moya isolated. He announced later Saturday that he had asked the state legislature to allow him to step aside indefinitely. \u201cSinaloa, the nation and the transformation movement come first,\u201d he wrote.<\/p>\n
Rocha Moya had been on leave since early May, days after federal prosecutors in New York unsealed a bombshell indictment accusing him and nine other current and former Mexican officials of protecting Sinaloa cartel members in exchange for bribes as they trafficked fentanyl, heroin, cocaine and methamphetamine into the U.S.<\/p>\n
The indictment marked the Trump administration\u2019s most significant public action against what it calls official corruption enabling Mexico\u2019s cartels, fueling new tension between the U.S. and Mexican governments. Sheinbaum has denied shielding Rocha Moya but rejected Washington\u2019s request to arrest and extradite the defendants without credible evidence, insisting that any prosecution take place in Mexico.<\/p>\n
Rocha Moya, 77, a staunch ally of Sheinbaum\u2019s mentor, former President Andr\u00e9s Manuel L\u00f3pez Obrador, denied wrongdoing and described the charges as a politically motivated attack. He initially stepped aside so he could cooperate with the Mexican investigation without relying on the constitutional immunity attached to his office. Whether taking leave stripped him of that protection \u2014 and whether his latest request to step aside indefinitely would do so again \u2014 remains disputed among Mexican legal scholars.<\/p>\n
After the indictment, the mayor of Culiac\u00e1n, Sinaloa\u2019s capital, and the state\u2019s deputy attorney general also stepped down from their posts, while two former senior state officials surrendered to U.S. authorities.<\/p>\n
Sinaloa has been engulfed for nearly two years in a bloody conflict between rival factions of the cartel that bears the state\u2019s name.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"MEXICO CITY (AP) \u2014 The embattled governor of Mexico\u2019s Sinaloa state has reversed his decision to return to…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":415396,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[82,84,83],"class_list":["post-415395","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-san-antonio","tag-san-antonio","tag-san-antonio-headlines","tag-san-antonio-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/415395","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=415395"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/415395\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/415396"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=415395"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=415395"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=415395"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}