A newspaper seller arranges newspapers reporting the El Paso, Texas, U.S., arrest of Mexican drug lord Ismael "El Mayo" Zambada and Joaquin Guzman Lopez, "El Chapo" Guzman's son, in Mexico City, Mexico July 26, 2024. GUSTAVO GRAF / REUTERS

Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum said Wednesday said she would ask the United States to share the $15 billion it expects to extract from convicted Mexican drug lord Ismael "El Mayo" Zambada with her country's poor.

Sinaloa drug cartel co-founder Zambada pleaded guilty in a New York court on Monday to murder and drug trafficking, particularly of fentanyl — a powerful narcotic responsible for tens of thousands of US overdose deaths annually.

In pleading guilty, the 77-year-old avoided the possibility of the death penalty but still faces life imprisonment at a sentencing hearing due at a later date.

As part of the deal, Zambada, who had initially pleaded not guilty, agreed to forfeit $15 billion in ill-gotten gains.

Addressing her regular morning press conference, Sheinbaum said: "If the United States government were to recover resources, then we would be asking for them to be given to Mexico for the poorest people."

Zambada's fall, which follows that of fellow Sinaloa cartel founder Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzman, already serving a life sentence in the United States, has led to speculation that the cartel's days are numbered.

Mexico's Security Secretary Omar Garcia Harfuch insisted Wednesday, however, that while some of the cartel's factions were diminished the organization was far from finished.

The cartel, which Washington has declared a terrorist group, is considered the biggest drug-trafficking organization in the world.

It operates on both sides of the U.S.-Mexican border.

Zambada led ruthless cartel
Sought by U.S. law enforcement for more than two decades, Zambada was taken into custody in July 2024 after arriving in a private plane at a Texas airport with Guzmán's son, Joaquín Guzmán López.

Zambada has said he was kidnapped in Mexico and hauled to the U.S. by Guzmán López, whose lawyer denies those claims.

According to prosecutors, Zambada presided over a vast and violent operation, with an arsenal of military-grade weapons, a private security force akin to an army, and a corps of "sicarios," or hitmen, who carried out assassinations, kidnappings and torture. Just months before his arrest, he ordered the murder of his own nephew, prosecutors said.

On Aug. 5, prosecutors said in a letter that Attorney General Pam Bondi had directed them not to pursue the death penalty for Zambada.

Following the July arrests and Zambada's allegations of kidnapping, horrific fighting erupted in Mexico between a cartel faction loyal to him and another tied to the "Chapitos," Guzmán's sons.

U.S. prosecutors say the Chapitos are known to torture their rivals while some of their victims were "fed dead or alive to tigers."

Earlier this month, Mexico sent 26 high-ranking cartel figures to the United States in the latest major deal with the Trump administration as American authorities ratchet up pressure on criminal networks smuggling drugs across the border.

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