Around this time last year, notorious drug kingpin, “El Chapo” was taken into custody after months galavanting as a fugitive.
Less than 24 hours before Donald Trump will be sworn in as the forty-fifth president, El Chapo is on a plane to New York.
From the NYT:
A federal court in Mexico denied an appeal by Mr. Guzmán’s lawyers to block the extradition, clearing the way for his transfer to the American authorities in New York, where he faces numerous charges for his role as the chieftain of the Sinaloa cartel.He was then put on a plane in Ciudad Juárez, near the border of Texas. The decision to extradite Mr. Guzmán is an about-face for the Mexican government, which once insisted that he would serve his long sentence in Mexico first. However, following a Houdini-like escape in 2015, when his associates tunneled him out of Mexico’s most secure prison, officials began to reconsider.Upon his recapture last year, they publicly said they would allow him to be extradited.In a statement on Thursday night, the United States Justice Department said it extended “its gratitude to the government of Mexico for their extensive cooperation and assistance in securing the extradition of Guzmán Loera to the United States.”The statement added that Mr. Guzmán faced six separate indictments in the United States.Mr. Guzmán was the embodiment of an identity the country has fought to shed for decades. To some, the uneducated farm-boy-turned-cartel-magnate was a Robin Hood figure for modern times, revered for his fight against the government and generosity to the poor. For others, he was a heartless criminal who flooded America’s streets with narcotics and left Mexico’s streets strewn with bodies.But it was his dramatic escapes that caught the attention of the world.
In 2015, Trump requested help from the FBI after El Chapo’s son threatened him on Twitter. Trump promised to “kick his [El Chapo’s] ass.”
El Chapo was set for extradition before Trump was elected, but the timing is certainly
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