Crime & Justice
El Mayo Zambada Was True Sinaloa Cartel Head While U.S. Media Focused on El Chapo
Danger Close
Danger Close | The Fourth Option Podcast: Ed Calderon
What was said
"We would hear names like El Mayo Zambada, the name of the historic head of the Sinaloa Cartel, who for everybody from 2004 on forward that I knew and would talk to, he was the head of the Sinaloa Cartel. Everybody knew him as that. But for some reason in the United States, they would mention El Chapo more. So there was a disconnect there."
Calderon exposed a significant intelligence disconnect between ground-level cartel operations and U.S. media narratives, stating that El Mayo Zambada, not El Chapo, was always recognized as the actual head of the Sinaloa Cartel by everyone in Mexican law enforcement from 2004 onward. This suggests either U.S. intelligence failure or deliberate misdirection in public reporting about cartel leadership structure.
Verification status
Attributed speaker claim
Egleze verified who said this and where. The underlying claim has not been independently established by Egleze.
Source and context
Egleze verified who said this and where. The underlying claim has not been independently established by Egleze.
- Programme
- Danger Close
- Episode
- Danger Close | The Fourth Option Podcast: Ed Calderon
- Clip time
- 15:49
- Original source
- Watch the source segment →
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