Northeast Cartel Uses Mexican Omnibus Buses to Smuggle Drugs: DEA; “Los Mayos” Provide Illicit Fentanyl

According to the report, the CDN “exploits Mexico’s Omnibus passenger line to traffic drugs into the United States.”

The US Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) on Thursday accused the Northeast Cartel, formerly “Los Zetas,” of using buses from Mexico’s Omnibus line to traffic drugs.

In its 2025 Annual Drug Threat Assessment, the agency expresses its concern over the alliance between the Northeast Cartel (CDN) and “Los Mayos.”

The report states that “Los Mayos” provide this cartel with “illicit fentanyl, crystal methamphetamine, and cocaine that the CDN traffics into the United States.”

According to the report, the CDN “exploits Mexico’s Omnibus passenger line to traffic drugs into the United States.

Among the cartel’s preferred methods of concealing drugs, the report describes, are “using personally operated vehicles, mules, tractors, and cargo trailers. It often uses routes under the control of the Sinaloa Cartel to facilitate the sale and distribution of drugs.

The Northeast Cartel, the assessment details, “has a dangerous reputation,” and its members often engage “in public acts of violence, including murder, torture, kidnapping and intimidation.

The cartel, in addition to trafficking drugs, is involved in the human smuggling business and “frequently abducts or exploits migrants for extortion or forced labor”.

Its partners, facilitators and affiliates, the report says, operate in Texas, Oklahoma, Georgia and the Midwest.

Source: El Universal