Criminal organizations showed this past year that they pose a growing threat to democracy in Latin America and the Caribbean, exerting nefarious influence over numerous elections and political situations throughout the region.
Some criminal groups directly threatened or killed candidates and elected officials, depriving citizens of their right to a freely chosen, truly representative government. In other cases, criminal networks used corruption to manipulate or obstruct elections, and to bend governments to their whim — regardless of the popular will.
This article is part of our Criminal GameChangers series for 2024. Read the other articles in the series here.
InSight Crime co-directors Steven Dudley and Jeremy McDermott will join some of our most experienced field investigators for a discussion of the Criminal GameChangers annual series and challenges for the year ahead. To attend and participate live, you can make a donation as small as $10.
Organized crime also had indirect impacts on political dynamics. Some political leaders pursued hardline anti-crime policies that are politically popular but often at odds with human rights. Others found their reputations stained by allegations of ties to criminal activity.
In a year that saw major elections in more than a half-dozen countries in the region, organized crime clearly demonstrated the scale of the threat it poses to democracy. And some early signs suggest the situation could spiral into a destructive cycle.
Direct Interference
The most brazen example of criminal democratic interference in 2024 occurred in Haiti, where gangs effectively overtook the state as the dominant power. Criminal groups forced the resignation of the prime minister, intimidated an international security support mission, and positioned themselves to pose a significant challenge to a return to democratic governance.
Mexico also saw an unprecedented campaign of politicized criminal violence amid the country’s largest-ever elections, held in June. To maintain the political influence that facilitates their illicit activities, criminals assassinated, attacked, and threatened dozens of political targets across the country during the campaign season. Armed men even stopped a vehicle carrying the eventual winner of the presidential race, Claudia Sheinbaum.
The violence did not stop in the wake of the election. Within days of Sheinbaum taking office in October, the mayor of a major city in southwest Mexico was beheaded, providing a gruesome reminder of how organized crime can nullify electoral outcomes.
Ecuador started the year still reeling from the gang-linked assassination of a presidential candidate in late 2023. Over the course of 2024, public servants found themselves increasingly in the crosshairs of the gangs, who targeted mayors, city council members, judges, prosecutors, and other political figures seen as potential obstacles to their criminal activities.
President Daniel Noboa declared a state of internal armed conflict in January to combat the gangs, and he has largely staked his campaign for reelection in February 2025 on his anti-crime efforts. Still, the threat of criminal interference and violence will loom over the vote.
Meanwhile, in Venezuela, President Nicolás Maduro used his alliances with criminal networks to intimidate voters ahead of the election held in July. After the disputed results, in which Maduro claimed victory despite evidence of an opposition win, he used criminal elements to help suppress discontent.
In Guatemala, criminal influence on politics did not take the form of outright violence. Instead, corruption networks used “lawfare” to try to stop the elected president from assuming office in January. Although that plan failed, these networks have continued to attack him using legal maneuvers.
Indirect Impacts
Organized crime also impacted democratic processes in 2024 in ways that were more subtle but similarly consequential.
Migration driven and fueled by organized crime remained at record levels. Criminal violence continues to displace people throughout the region, which in turn fuels human smuggling, trafficking, and other criminal economies along migration routes.
Immigration, as well as the trafficking of fentanyl and other drugs from Mexico, were prominent themes in the US presidential campaign that saw Donald Trump re-elected in the November vote. As he has done throughout his political career, Trump capitalized on overblown fears about Latin American criminal groups to support his anti-immigration agenda and propel himself to victory.
SEE ALSO: What Trump’s Hardline Immigration Policy Means for Crime on the US-Mexico Border
Similarly, in Chile, crime — often baselessly blamed on migrants — has rocketed to the top of the list of citizens’ concerns. The government has responded by pursuing punitive approaches, which raise human rights concerns and may be counterproductive in the fight against an actual rise in criminality there.
Chile’s neighbor, Argentina, has gone in a similar direction, particularly since President Javier Milei took office in late 2023. However, experts told us that putting soldiers on the streets and packing more people into jails will do little to disrupt the power of the country’s most dangerous crime bosses, who operate from within the prison system.
Uruguay, too, saw rising concern over organized crime coalesce into a political consensus around repressive policies. The dynamic was evident in the run-up to the presidential elections held in October, in which crime and violence featured as major issues.
In El Salvador, hardline anti-crime policies formed the backbone of the reelection in February of President Nayib Bukele, whose party also won a supermajority in congress, aided by the success of his harsh anti-gang crackdown. Although his administration has dealt a serious blow to formerly powerful gangs, the extreme measures have generated significant human rights concerns.
And as we will explore in a separate installment in this year-end series, two presidents saw their reputations tainted by alleged ties to organized crime.
Honduran President Xiomara Castro faced a political firestorm in September after InSight Crime published a narco video implicating the first family in bribery negotiations. Mexican President Andrés Manuel López Obrador also came under fire earlier in the year when we revealed that US authorities had investigated whether his 2006 presidential campaign had taken money from drug traffickers.
Threat to Democracy
As organized crime increasingly infuses itself into politics in Latin America and the Caribbean, and drags down the region’s economies, several recent studies show support for democracy in the region is eroding.
These trends appear to be combining in a negative feedback loop. Declining faith in democratic institutions weakens them, and creates space for organized crime to thrive, further eroding trust in democracy.
But citizens recognize the threat. In 2024, for the second year in a row, survey respondents across the region named organized crime as the top political risk facing Latin America and the Caribbean.
As we have shown in our podcast and our solutions coverage, the region is full of examples of citizens coming together to fight back against organized crime. Belief in democratic action remains strong, despite the threats democracy faces.
In the coming year, which marks our 15th anniversary, InSight Crime will keep highlighting stories that show how strengthening the fight against crime will also strengthen democracy.