US Treasury sanctions Mexican fuel‑smuggling network tied to CJNG

On June 30 2026 the U.S. Department of the Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) sanctioned two Mexican nationals—Oscar Guillermo Juraidini Silva, identified as the cartel’s “financial brain,” and J. Refugio Ruiz Villagómez—and nine companies that operated a cross‑border fuel‑smuggling and tax‑evasion scheme for the Jalisco New Generation Cartel (CJNG). The network used falsified customs paperwork, shell firms and bribed officials to move gasoline, diesel and naphtha from the United States into Mexico while evading the IEPS tax, generating tens to hundreds of millions of dollars annually for the cartel and, according to the Treasury, financing political campaigns and media in Mexico. The sanctions blocked all U.S. assets of the designated persons and entities and prompted a FinCEN alert for banks. The Mexican Unidad de Inteligencia Financiera (UIF) and the Secretaría de Hacienda added the same individuals and companies to its blocked‑persons list, freezing accounts of up to 20 subjects. The investigation was coordinated with U.S. agencies—including the DEA, HSI, FBI, IRS‑CI, BIS and CBP—and highlighted the cartel’s shift from drug trafficking to lucrative fuel‑theft operations that cost Mexico over $11 billion in lost tax revenue last year.