Trump administration ties El Paso airspace closure to Mexican cartel drones

The Federal Aviation Administration reopened the airspace around El Paso International Airport in Texas on Wednesday morning, just hours after it announced a 10-day closure that would have grounded all flights to and from the airport.

The FAA said in a social media post that it has lifted the temporary closure of the airspace over El Paso, saying there was no threat to commercial aviation and that all flights will resume.

Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy said in a post on X that the FAA and the Defense Department “acted swiftly to address a cartel drone incursion. The threat has been neutralized, and there is no danger to commercial travel in the region.” He said normal flights are resuming.

What to know:

El Paso is a border city with a population of nearly 700,000, growing when you include the surrounding metro area. It’s a hub of cross-border commerce alongside the neighboring city of Ciudad Juárez in Mexico. The airport describes itself as the gateway to West Texas, southern New Mexico, and northern Mexico.

The closure has left some travelers stranded, with few nearby options. The closest major U.S. airport is in Albuquerque, New Mexico, more than 270 miles away.

Mexican cartels have long used drones to traffic drugs, control migrant crossings along the border, and wage war with rival cartels and authorities. Mexico first issued an international alert about the use of remote-controlled aircraft in 2010, and the practice has only continued to expand.

Airspace closure redirected medical evacuations to New Mexico

“Medical evacuation flights were forced to divert to Las Cruces,” El Paso Mayor Renard Johnson said at a Wednesday morning news conference. “All aviation operations were grounded, including emergency flights. This was a major and unnecessary disruption, one that has not occurred since 9/11.”

Las Cruces is about 45 miles (72 kilometers) from El Paso.

Johnson added that a significant amount of necessary surgical equipment en route from Dallas and other parts of the country “did not show up here in El Paso.”

Congresswoman says information from federal government ‘does not add up’

U.S. Rep. Veronica Escobar, a Democrat whose district includes El Paso, had urged the FAA to lift the restrictions in a statement Wednesday morning, saying neither her office, the city of El Paso, nor airport operations received advance notice.

“I believe the FAA owes the community and the country an explanation as to why this happened so suddenly and abruptly and was lifted so suddenly and abruptly,” she said during a morning news conference, adding that there was “nothing extraordinary about any drone incursion into the U.S. that I’m aware of.”

Later, she said, “The information coming from the federal government does not add up.”

When asked about Escobar’s remarks that any possible drones posed no threat, the Pentagon said it didn’t have a comment.

Mexico and US security officials slated to meet in Washington

Mexican defense and navy secretaries will meet with Northern Command officials in Washington on Wednesday in a meeting attended by several other countries, according to Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum.

Sheinbaum said during her morning press conference that Mexican officials would “listen” in the meeting.

“They are not taking any position other than the one we already know, which is the defense of sovereignty,” she said. “We will inform you in due course.”

She noted that Mexican Security Secretary Omar García Harfuch, who has spearheaded her government’s strategy to combat cartels, will also meet with American security officials tomorrow.

The meetings are part of ongoing security talks between the two governments.

DHS official testified before Congress last year about cartel usage of drones

Steven Willoughby, the deputy director of the counter-drone program at the Department of Homeland Security, told lawmakers in July that nearly every day cartels are using drones to try to bring drugs across the U.S.-Mexico border and surveil Border Patrol agents.

More than 27,000 drones were detected within 500 meters (1,640 feet) of the southern border in the last six months of 2024, he testified, most flying late at night.

Homeland Security has said agents have seized thousands of pounds of methamphetamine, fentanyl, and other drugs that cartels have tried to bring across the border by drone over the past few years.