Violent drug gang threatens US tourists and Kash Patel in terrifying message after raids and weapons seizures

Violent cartel members have threatened US tourists in Mexico in an effort to send a warning to FBI Director Kash Patel as the administration continues to crack down on drug and weapons trades.

Extraordinary banners have been erected in Baja California responding to recent raids and weapons seizures conducted by the FBI.

The messages claim that starting Sunday, cartel gunmen from the Los Chapitos faction of the Sinaloa cartel will begin targeting US citizens who are in Mexico with violence.

In particular, tourists and Americans living in Cabo San Lucas and San Jose have been warned they will be targeted.

Written in Spanish, the warnings state: ‘You will be the ones to blame. We’ll show how we’ll make this war starting 5/10/2025 on all Americans residing in areas where we have a presence… especially those living in San Jose del Cabo and Cabo San Lucas.

‘We are the ones who rule here and we’ll demonstrate what we are capable of if you don’t stop arresting our people and decommissioning our loads and weapons.’

Cartels are known to hang ‘narco banners’ from bridges and overpasses in an effort to deliver a message to governments or their rivals.

But Christian Agúndez Gómez, mayor of San Jose del Cabo maintained there is no credible proof of the existence of the banners.

Extraordinary banners have been erected in Baja California responding to recent raids and weapons seizures conducted by the FBI

The banners were specifically addressed to FBI Director Kash Patel (pictured)

‘It’s not true,’ he said. ‘We have investigated the information and determined the banners were never placed.’

He added: ‘There are necessary investigations that are still ongoing. We will monitor results issued by the attorney general.

‘Unfortunately, social media sometimes plays a role against people’s peace of mind, that’s why it’s important to verify the information with official sources before distributing it.’

Local news sources railed against the mayor’s comments, maintaining they had received images of the banners from multiple sources, according to Border Report.

The banners were specifically addressed to Patel and Terry Cole, director of the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration.

Mexico’s attorney general in Baja California Sur said there were instances in which banners had been falsely placed to spread fear in the community, despite having no known gang or cartel links.

The Trump administration earlier this month declared the United States is in an ‘armed conflict’ with drug cartels amid recent strikes on boats in the Carribean trying to cross into US waters.

‘The President determined that the United States is in a non-international armed conflict with these designated terrorist organizations,’ a memo seen by AP states.

The messages claim that starting Sunday, cartel gunmen from the Los Chapitos faction of the Sinaloa cartel will begin targeting US citizens who are in Mexico with violence

Trump directed the Pentagon to ‘conduct operations against them pursuant to the law of armed conflict.’

‘The United States has now reached a critical point where we must use force in self-defense and defense of others against the ongoing attacks by these designated terrorist organizations.’

Earlier this week, the US Treasury sanctioned a network of companies and their affiliates that allegedly supplied precursor chemicals to make fentanyl to a faction of Mexico’s Sinaloa cartel.

A dozen Mexico-based companies and eight of the people managing them were accused of using their pharmaceutical, laboratory, chemical, cleaning and real estate businesses to purchase the chemicals and provide them to the Sinaloa cartel’s ‘Chapitos’ faction, run by sons of the former Sinaloa leader Joaquín ‘El Chapo’ Guzmán.

The cartel is among an expanding number of Latin American criminal groups that the Trump administration has designated as foreign terrorist organizations, part of an ongoing effort to more aggressively go after drug-trafficking groups.

‘President Trump has made clear that stopping the deadly flow of drugs into our country is a top national security priority,’ Under Secretary for Terrorism and Financial Intelligence John K. Hurley wrote in a statement.

‘The Treasury Department is committed to dismantling the complex financial networks that support these terrorist organizations.’