With the assets, determined by the United States justice as part of Joaquín “El Chapo” Guzmán drug business enrichment, the southern border wall could be financed. This Senator Ted Cruz´s proposal was received with “great interest” by President Donald Trump.
The president of the United States, a New York magnate who became a politician and reached the White House in 2016, knows how to recognize opportunities and thanks to this ability he built his economic empire.
Thus, he considered “interesting” the proposal of Senator Ted Cruz to finance the Mexico border wall with the millions of dollars that El Chapo won through his drug trafficking network.
Trump made this statement during the visit of the Colombian president, Ivan Duque, to the White House
“Anything Ted does is interesting. So that’s certainly an interesting one,”Trump answered when asked by journalists in the White House Oval Office.
Now, the journalistic detail that can be highlighted from Congressman Ted Cruz´s proposal , is that according to the Prosecutor, the profits gained by “El Chapo” during the years in which he carried out his illegal activities, until he was finally arrested in 2016 and extradited to New York (USA), has been estimated in 14 billion dollars.
The Texas Senator´s intention is that the Justice Department may identify and locate assets from the Sinaloa Cartel former head, in order to auction them and transform them into a budget for building a barrier just across the border where the drug used to pass.
The US president response comes a day after Cruz posted a message on Twitter with his idea to finance the wall, just minutes after the jury’s verdict was published against El Chapo, who was found guilty of all the charges
Sen. Ted Cruz Proposes Unique Border Wall Solution: Make EL CHAPO Pay For It https://t.co/lXDpDfbfaz
— Daily Wire (@realDailyWire) February 12, 2019
“America’s justice system prevailed today in convicting Joaquín Guzmán Loera, aka El Chapo, on all 10 counts. U.S. prosecutors are seeking $14 billion in drug profits & other assets from El Chapo which should go towards funding our wall to secure the border.“Cruz proposed.
This initiative, also called “Ley Chapo” or The Ensuring Lawful Collection of Hidden Assets to Provide Order Act, would divert the cartel leader’s drug trafficking incomes to finance border security.
The budget to raise the border wall, an electoral promise of Trump, was the main reason for disagreement between Democrats and Republicans which caused the longest shutdown in US history between the past December 22 and January 25.
During that administrative closure, Trump threatened on several occasions to persist on the construction of the wall using his power to do so through a national emergency declaration.
Translated by: José Espinoza