Mexican forces killed the country’s most wanted cartel leader on Sunday. Within hours, the cartel fought back—not just with guns and burning buses, but with lies.
Dozens of false images and reports flooded social media as loyalists to Nemesio “El Mencho” Oseguera Cervantes sought to make their retaliatory wave of violence appear far and more terrifying than it really was. Among the fake claims are:
Assassins had taken over Guadalajara’s airport, a plane was on fire on the runway, and that smoke billowed from a church and multiple buildings in the tourist hub of Puerto Vallarta
All of it was false, and it was shared tens of thousands of times.
The New Weapon: AI-Generated Terror
The images were convincing. One showed a Volaris plane engulfed in flames at Guadalajara airport—a scene fact-checkers later determined was generated by artificial intelligence with 97% probability. Another depicted the Puerto Vallarta cathedral ablaze, an AI fabrication that nonetheless spread panic among tourists and residents alike.
Researchers say this marks a significant escalation in cartel tactics. Mexican criminal groups have long used social media for propaganda—recycling old videos, posting violent images from other conflicts, even distributing aid during the pandemic to burnish their image. But the emergence of AI-generated content has enabled something new: the ability to manufacture terror at scale, instantly, with images that look real enough to fool millions.
“They are trying to show that the Mexican government doesn’t have control over the country,” said Jane Esberg, assistant professor at the University of Pennsylvania, who has studied how Mexican criminal groups use social media. She said the strategy creates a narrative that the cartel has a presence all over the country, making it difficult to establish the true scale of the violence and what security forces are actually facing.
The Government Responds
Mexican Security Secretary Omar Garcia Harfuch told reporters Monday that authorities had already identified “various accounts” pushing fake news and would investigate those that have “direct relationships with an organized crime group.” He acknowledged there were other accounts “dedicated to spreading lies” without established criminal links.
President Claudia Sheinbaum said authorities were working quickly to refute misinformation, noting there were “many, many fake news stories” circulating after El Mencho’s killing.
But the damage was already done.
Shifting the Narrative
Real violence did erupt across Mexico after El Mencho’s death. Loyalists set up more than 250 roadblocks, torched buses and stores, attacked gas stations, and killed at least 25 National Guard members in six separate incidents. The cartel’s bloody response was undeniable.
But online, the picture became distorted. The fake images—the burning plane, the engulfed cathedral, the airport overrun—painted a portrait of chaos far exceeding the reality on the ground. For every actual burned bus, a dozen AI-generated fires spread across WhatsApp and X.
Pablo Calderon, an associate professor in politics and international relations at Northeastern University London, said cartels use social media to amplify their image and power and to shape public opinion, including through misinformation.
“Sunday was a good day for Mexican security forces,” he said. “But organized crime has been successful in shifting the narrative, away from the military raid to chaos.”
The Rise of Narco Influencers
The propaganda campaign was amplified by a new phenomenon: narco influencers. These social media personalities have built large followings by glorifying organized crime, and they leveraged their platforms to spread false narratives.
The combination of AI-generated content and influencer networks has created a disinformation ecosystem that experts say is nearly impossible to counter in real time. By the time fact-checkers debunk an image, it has already been viewed by millions.
Why It Matters
Mexico’s violence makes it difficult for journalists to access parts of the country to report on the ground and sort fact from fiction. In that vacuum, cartel propaganda fills the void.
“It’s often difficult to determine with certainty which accounts or blogs are tied to the cartels and spreading fake news,” Esberg said.
The result is a nation that cannot trust what it sees. A real military victory becomes, in the public mind, a story of government impotence. A cartel on its heels projects an image of invincibility.
El Mencho is dead. But the cartel he built has learned that in the information age, a well-crafted lie can be as powerful as any weapon. And in the 24 hours after his death, they proved it.
