The killing of one of Mexico’s most-wanted cartel leaders triggered violent reprisals across the country and experts warn it could lead to prolonged destabilization that pushes more people to flee for the U.S.-Mexico border.
On Sunday, Mexican security forces, backed by U.S. intelligence, took out the notorious leader of one of the country’s most violent cartels, the Cartel Jalisco Nueva Generación (CJNG). The Mexican federal government said Nemesio Rubén Oseguera Cervantes, also known as “El Mencho,” was wounded during a clash in Tapalpa, Jalisco, and died while being transferred to Mexico City.
Panic and chaos quickly ensued. Heavily-armed men blocked roads in at least a dozen Mexican states, setting vehicles ablaze and damaging local Oxxo convenience stores. Several flights out of Jalisco were canceled. The United States Embassy in Mexico told U.S. citizens in nine Mexican states to shelter in place, including in Baja California on the border with California. Local officials in Tecate told residents not to leave their homes.
Mexico’s national statistics agency, INEGI, has repeatedly shown that regions plagued by cartel conflict suffer some of the country’s highest homicide rates. It’s a pattern experts say historically drives internal displacement and northbound migration when violence surges.
A 2022 survey by the United Nations’ International Organization for Migration found a large majority of Mexican migrants cited violence, extortion, or organized crime as reasons for leaving their communities, according to the Council on Foreign Relations.
In January 2022, the Associated Press reported that cartel violence in western Mexico displaced 35,000 people, highlighting fighting between CJNG and local rivals in Michoacán. In May 2021, news stories described plans for a Tijuana shelter aimed at people displaced by violence from Aguililla, Michoacán, a clear example of how violence-driven flight affects the border region.
When high-value cartel leaders fall, historically violence spikes in the short term, said Cecilia Farfán-Méndez, an expert on Mexican organized crime and U.S.-Mexico security cooperation, adding that the impacts can often be prolonged and felt even years later.
“Now with the events from yesterday in Mexico, certainly we have to be cautious about what could ensue and we cannot rule out the possibility that violence could escalate,” she said.
Farfán-Méndez, the head of the North American Observatory at the Global Initiative Against Transnational Organized Crime, was in Tijuana on Monday where she described tension as the border city braced for more possible fallout.
“One thing that is very palpable here, and I think it’s similar to other times, along border cities is the uncertainty of what could happen,” she said.
Another expert said the situation could lead to people being displaced, but he doesn’t think that it will translate into people actually reaching United States soil because of how secure the border currently is, after policies implemented during President Trump’s first and second terms.
The Border Patrol documented 237,538 encounters with migrants at the U.S.-Mexico border in the 2025 fiscal year, which began in October 2024 and ended in September 2025, according to government data. That was down by nearly 95% from more than 1.5 million encounters in fiscal year 2024, more than 2 million in fiscal year 2023 and a record of 2.2 million in fiscal year 2022. It’s the lowest level in more than five decades.
Tony Payan, director of the Claudio X. González Center for the U.S. and Mexico at Rice University’s Baker Institute, said past crackdowns on cartel leaders have often failed to curb violence. “We’ve done that for a very long time, thinking that because you cut off the head that the body will wither away. It doesn’t happen that way,” said Payan, comparing it to shaking a bee hive, angering the bees.
“One thing that has not happened is that crime goes away,” he said
Payan said violence could easily affect border states as rival factions fight for control. “There might be a spike in violence in border states and that’s dangerous because even though the violence has never really spilt across into the United States” it is happening right on the border, he said. “It puts everybody on edge.”
“We’re going to see effects on the border, but I suspect that these are going to be way before you have any wave of potentially displaced people moving to the border,” Payan added.
Both Farfán-Méndez and Payan said focusing solely on taking out cartels ignores the root causes of crime and can fuel more violence. Both said firepower behind cartel violence is tied to weapons flowing southbound into Mexico from the United States. Guns from the United States are what cartels use to control and terrorize residents in Mexico, said Farfán-Méndez.
“If the U.S. is serious about a collaborative effort, they must include not just forcing Mexico to confront the cartels … but they must also understand that something has to be done about weapons, the illegal export of weapons into Mexico,” said Payan.
A U.S. Customs and Border Protection spokesperson said the agency was monitoring the violence in Mexico, but did not expect migration impacts.
“We have the most secure border in American history, and it will remain closed to illegal entry – just like it has for the past year under President Trump. U.S. Customs and Border Protection is aware of and monitoring the violence in Mexico,” a CBP spokesperson emailed CalMatters. “All CBP ports of entry along the Southwest border are open and fully operational, and there are no planned closures. Travelers can check official border wait times at www.bwt.cbp.gov. For more information about travel in Mexico, CBP defers to the government of Mexico.”