How a Venezuelan prison gang built a cross-border criminal network along migration routes
What began as a prison-based gang in Venezuela has evolved into one of the most concerning transnational criminal organizations operating across the Americas. Known as Tren de Aragua, the group is now active across large swaths of Mexico and has extended its reach into the United States—largely by embedding itself along migrant corridors and forming tactical alliances rather than attempting to dominate territory outright.
Mexican security authorities have identified Tren de Aragua activity in at least 11 states, spanning the country’s southern, central, and northern regions. Its strategy is not cartel-style conquest. Instead, the group operates as a form of criminal “outsourcing,” offering services—human trafficking, migrant extortion, sexual exploitation, and logistical coordination—to local criminal groups that already control territory.
Operating Along Mexico’s Migration Spine
In southern Mexico, particularly Chiapas, Tabasco, and Quintana Roo, Tren de Aragua has been detected collaborating with local criminal groups that control key migration routes. These areas are critical choke points for migrants entering from Central and South America. Authorities have linked the organization to extortion rings targeting migrants and to sexual exploitation networks in tourist hubs like Cancún, where vulnerable women are coerced or trafficked.
In central Mexico, including Veracruz, Puebla, Hidalgo, the State of Mexico, and Guanajuato, the group plays a more logistical role. Security sources describe the State of Mexico as a hub for settlement and coordination, where members establish financial and operational bases away from border scrutiny. In Mexico City, leadership figures reportedly oversee finances and negotiations, particularly in boroughs such as Cuauhtémoc, Tlalpan, and Gustavo A. Madero, often in coordination with local groups like La Unión Tepito and Anti-Unión.
A January federal operation in the Valle Gómez neighborhood led to the arrest of six suspected members, including a woman identified by authorities as a key collector and financial liaison between Tren de Aragua and local criminal networks involved in prostitution.
Northern Mexico and the U.S. Connection
In northern border states such as Tamaulipas and Chihuahua, including cities like Ciudad Juárez, Reynosa, and Matamoros, Tren de Aragua’s role shifts again. Here, the organization is tied to the final stage of illegal crossings into the United States, coordinating safe houses, transportation, and payments. U.S. authorities have since confirmed the group’s presence in American cities, including New York, reinforcing its classification as a transnational criminal organization.
The U.S. government, through the Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC), has sanctioned individuals and shell companies linked to the group, citing money laundering schemes that span Mexico, Colombia, and beyond. These schemes reportedly include front companies, the use of intermediaries, small international transfers to avoid detection, and cryptocurrency purchases.
Tren de Aragua’s growth reflects a broader shift in organized crime: flexible, network-based operations that exploit migration, weak oversight, and cross-border financial systems. For Latino communities on both sides of the border, the impact is direct—migrants targeted for extortion, neighborhoods exposed to exploitation networks, and legitimate businesses distorted by money laundering.
Rather than a single cartel war, authorities now face a quieter but deeply embedded threat—one that operates in the shadows of migration itself, crossing borders as easily as the people it preys upon.
