Two of Mexico's most wanted men have been arrested in El Paso, Texas. There are ledges to be leaders of the powerful Sinaloa drug cartel. What will their capture mean for the drug trade in the U.S. especially deadly fentanyl? I'm Michelle Martin, that's Amartina, and this is Up First from NPR News. Vice President Kamala Harris met with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. Afterward, she spoke about her support of Israel and her empathy for the plight of Palestinians.
Israel has a right to defend itself and how it does so matters. Did she offer a different message than President Biden? Also the 2024 Summer Olympic Games are underway in France, and tonight LeBron James and Cogougoth will carry the flag for Team USA and Paris' opening ceremonies. Stay with us, we've got all the news you need to start your day. Support for NPR and the following message come from Amazon Business. Everyone could use
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It's male. El Mayo Zumbata founded the Sinolua Cartel along with Joaquin Elchafo Guzmán. Last night, U.S. authorities announced he had been arrested and they say he will appear before an American judge soon. NPR's Eater Peralta is following this story from his base in Mexico City. Eater, tell us about this arrest and who this man is. So about the arrest, we know very little. U.S. officials tell us this was a multi-agency
operation. And we know that he's my, El Mayo Zumbata somehow ended up on a plane to the United States. U.S. officials also announced that they had also arrested Joaquin Guzmán Lopez, the son of Elchafo Guzmán. And one of the leaders of the Sinolua Cartel, but the big fish here is El Mayo Zumbata. He's arguably the most important drug lord in Mexico and perhaps even the world. And he had never been caught before. Unlike his once partner
Elchafo, El Mayo Zumbata kept a low profile. U.S. officials first indicted him more than 20 years ago. And they accused him of shipping tons of drugs into the U.S. and using millions of dollars to bribe some of Mexico's most powerful public officials. And this man is important because he is believed to lead one of the most important factions of the Sinolua Cartel.
And the Sinolua Cartel is one of the biggest exporters of synthetic drugs in the world. And that includes fentanyl, which kills tens of thousands of Americans each year. Alright, so a very high profile arrest. What could this mean for the drug war and the drug trade? I spoke to Herardo Rodriguez last night. He studied security at the University of the Americas, Puebla. And he says we will continue to see fentanyl smuggled into the U.S. Rodriguez
says the demand in the United States is too great. And the profit incentive remains the same. But this is a huge hit for the Sinolua Cartel. Remember, it's former leader, El Chapaguzman, is serving a life sentence in the U.S. Two of his sons are also in custody. And the Cartel has now lost a decades-long leader. So it leaves a huge power vacuum. And Professor Rodriguez says that we should expect to see a spike in violence.
Maybe what we can see is what we saw in Colombia is the polarization of the biggest cartels. Maybe the dispute will arise inside the cartel of Sinolua. So he's saying that maybe the Sinolua Cartel will implode or maybe all of this ends with an all-out fight between Sinolua and the second most powerful cartel, the Halesco New Generation. And it's important to note that none of this would actually be new. Sinolua
was already fractured and these two cartels are already fighting a war. Just this week, he got so bad in southern Mexico that some 600 civilians had to flee across the border to Guatemala. Now, the drug trade in Mexico has already been a big deal in U.S. presidential politics for Republicans, including Donald Trump, have proposed bombing cartels in Mexico to stop fentanyl from coming into the U.S. Any sense, Adorod, how this might play out of the campaign trail?
Look, this is no doubt a huge win for the Biden administration, but it's not a silver bullet. It doesn't solve the addiction problem in the U.S. It doesn't solve the violence or trafficking problem in Mexico. So I would bet we'll keep hearing much of the same rhetoric coming from American politicians. MPR's Aitor Betalta reporting from Mexico City. Thank you. Thank you, Aitor. Vice President Kamala Harris met with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu yesterday.
In her words, she reiterated her support for Israel, but she also had some frank words. Yes, she said it's time for the war in Gaza to end. She said that Israel has the right to defend itself, but that the fight against Hamas in Gaza for the past nine months has been devastating. The images of dead children and desperate, hungry people fleeing for safety sometimes displaced for the second, third or fourth time.
We cannot look away in the face of these tragedies. We cannot allow ourselves to become numb to the suffering. And I will not be silent. MPR White House correspondent Osma Khaled was in the room. What did you make of those remarks? Well, what we saw amounted to the first foreign policy speech of Harris' campaign. And it's also the most forceful statement that she has made on Gaza since she's become the likely Democratic nominee. You know, this war and how President Biden has handled it has
been a divisive issue for Democrats. And we talked about this yesterday on the show, but some Democrats were curious to know whether Vice President Harris would act differently than Biden if she were to be elected president. And yesterday, we heard her speak directly to those who have disagreed with the administration's actions at one point. And as I just told Prime Minister Netanyahu, it is time to get this deal done.
So to everyone who has been calling for a ceasefire and to everyone who yearns for peace, I see you and I hear you. Let's get the deal done so we can get a ceasefire to end the war. Let's bring the hostages home and let's provide much-needed relief to the Palestinian people.
This all came a couple of hours after President Biden also met Israel's Prime Minister and it's noteworthy to me that it was the Vice President, not the President, who delivered on camera remarks after these Israeli leaders visit. So is all this a new thing for Harris? I mean, you've been listening to her speak about this for months now. Has anything changed? Well, the substance of what she said was similar to what she has said in the past and what
we've heard from Biden, the same policies, but her tone was different. She tried to show the complexity of the situation, asking Americans not to see the war in Gaza through a binary lens and there was this moment where she recited out loud one by one the names of Americans being held hostage by Hamas. She was also more direct than Biden in the empathy she expressed
for Palestinians, using some words that this administration has not used before. I think what was noticeable was that collectively this speech felt like one of the first times that we heard the Vice President speak on foreign policy more in her own voice rather than just as an emissary for Biden. Now you've been talking as many people this week about what they want to hear from Kamala Harris on this issue. How do her remarks square with their expectations?
I spoke to a number of people on the left of the Democratic Party who have been disappointed with how Biden has handled this war. Now note that these interviews were largely before the Vice President's remarks, but one common theme was that they wanted to know if Harris would offer a different message than Biden. I think she has a delicate balancing act in the months ahead. In this race, she has to speak to multiple parts of the Democratic
Party at once. She's trying to win back some of the Democratic voters who felt alienated by how Biden has handled the war, but she also does not want to alienate supporters of Israel who make up a key part of the party. And to that point, we saw a sign yesterday of this when she issued a statement condemning protesters in Washington, D.C. for spray-printing pro-Hamas slogans on a monument during protests. MPR White House correspondent Osma Khaled, thank you very much. Good to speak with you.
Tonight, in Paris, hundreds of thousands of people will line up along miles of the river send to watch the opening ceremony of the Summer Olympics. Instead of a march through a stadium, though, something we're used to seeing, the athletes and performers will float on boats down the river. The spectacle will officially kick off two plus weeks of competition. MPR's Becky Sullivan is there in Paris. Becky, so what does Paris look like ahead of tonight's
big event? Because essentially, the city is a massive stadium for this. Oh, yeah. So Olympic fever is in full force here. Walking around, you can see tons of international visitors who are out and about wearing their country's gear. I should say that the heart of Paris itself is been quiet because officials have been racing to set things up. Grand stands along the banks of the river and on the bridges. There's a security perimeter around
all of that. So there are fences around sort of many of the city's most iconic landmarks. But still walking around, you can catch little glimpses of rehearsal going on, dancers on rooftops and things like that. It's a little rainy and gloomy outside, I should say. We're all hoping for it to clear up in time because it should, like said, really be a spectacle with the backdrop of Paris and the Eiffel Tower all right. It's sunset. Yeah. Celine Dion and Lady Gaga cannot be restrained.
But we're in, hopefully they'll still sing. Now, it wouldn't be, in Olympic games, really without some kind of controversy, including a very escalating war of words between the US and the International Olympic Committee on the issue of doping back to you. What's going on with that? So yes, so this dates back to this spring when there were revelations that 23 Chinese swimmers had failed doping tests in the months before the Tokyo Olympics. That was back
in 2021. And the world anti-doping agency, which is deeply tied to the IOC, had known about these test failures, but still allowed the swimmers to compete in the Olympics anyway. Three of them won gold medals. Several of them will compete here in Paris. US officials have accused WADA, essentially, of like deference to China. The US Department of Justice has opened an investigation in response to that criticism. The IOC attacked US officials this
week in a session. They attached a writer. In fact, to the Salt Lake City bid for the Winter Olympics in 2034 that would allow the IOC to yank back. Those Olympics at this escalates just yesterday, the leaders of three congressional committees and subcommittee sent a letter to put WADA on notice. It's just a mess. Yeah, it is. Now, the opening ceremony is tonight as we've been talking about, but the games are underway. Team USA women's soccer. They open up with a three-nail win over Zambia.
What are you looking most forward to seeing in the two weeks that you're going to be there? You lucky duck. Well, actually, let me answer this question in the eyes of Team USA basketball star Steph Curry, who in the USA, of course, is a huge sports mega star. He's a four-time NBA champ with the Golden State Warriors. Basically, his entire career, he's always been at the center attention at any game he has played. But here in Paris, he is making his first Olympic
appearance. And even for someone like him, it's just a totally different, more humbling experience. He talked about that yesterday at a press conference. When you get around the other athletes, it's like we're all representing our country and the NBA stuff that didn't make us any different, you know, than the next guy or girl to our left or our right. We all got the same colors, the same outfits, the same letters across your chest.
He talked about looking forward to swimming and gymnastics. Me too, swimming kicks off with a huge race tomorrow. There's the women's 400 meter freestyle. This is truly a clash of giants with the US star Katie Ladecki. Australia's Ariana Tipmas, Canada Summer Macintosh. That'll be amazing. Overall, like Steph, this is my first Olympics 2A. So I'm trying to take his advice. He said, be where your feet are. I'm just going to try to take it all in and enjoy it.
So in it all, Becky, I can't wait to see Noah Lyos. I want to see if you can pull off the double 100 meter and the 200 meter can't wait. And PR's Becky Sullivan in Paris. Becky, thanks a lot. You're so welcome. And that's a first for Friday, July 26th. I mean, Martinez. And I'm Michelle Martin. And don't forget, up first, heirs on the weekend too. I used Sharasco and Scott Simon have the news. It will be here in this feed or wherever you get your podcasts.
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