Joint military and law enforcement operations targeting the Los Chapitos faction of the Sinaloa Cartel have swept through multiple neighborhoods in San José del Cabo since late May. The raids have produced seizures of high-powered rifles, grenade launcher ammunition, more than 100 improvised explosive devices, bulletproof vests, and stolen vehicles. Armed confrontations between soldiers and cartel gunmen have occurred in at least one neighborhood. The operations are ongoing, and they explain the heavy military presence visible across the San José del Cabo corridor over the past two weeks.
Los Cabos Cartel Operations Target a Sinaloa Faction in Crisis
Los Chapitos is the name given to the faction of the Sinaloa Cartel run by the sons of Joaquín “El Chapo” Guzmán Loera. The group has long treated Baja California Sur as both a financial base and a territorial stronghold. Los Cabos, with its booming real estate market and high-value commercial corridors, offered infrastructure for money laundering and logistics that made the region a strategic priority for the faction.
But the faction has been fracturing since 2023. That year, Mexican forces captured Ovidio Guzmán López, one of El Chapo’s sons, in Culiacán, Sinaloa. His extradition to the United States followed. Then in July 2024, his brother Joaquín Guzmán López voluntarily surrendered to U.S. authorities at an airstrip near El Paso, Texas, in a dramatic episode that also delivered Sinaloa Cartel co-founder Ismael “El Mayo” Zambada into American custody.
Those two events triggered a violent internal war within the Sinaloa Cartel. In Sinaloa state, the Chapitos faction and the Zambada faction (known as Los Mayos) fought openly for months, killing hundreds. The fallout rippled into Baja California Sur, where Los Chapitos had operated with relative impunity for years. Two brothers now remain at large: Iván Archivaldo Guzmán Salazar and Jesús Alfredo Guzmán Salazar. Both are identified by Mexican and U.S. security agencies as the faction’s current operational leaders, and both are priority targets.
A federal intelligence source told the Tijuana-based investigative weekly ZETA that the federal government’s explicit directive is to pressure and dismantle Los Chapitos’ operations in Baja California Sur. That instruction marks a shift. For years, critics accused federal authorities of tolerating cartel activity in Los Cabos so long as it did not disrupt tourism. The current campaign suggests that tolerance has ended, at least for this faction.
Santa Anita, Monterreal, and La Ballena: Where Raids Have Occurred
The operations began after residents in the Santa Anita neighborhood reported armed men to authorities. Military personnel responded, and a confrontation followed. Santa Anita sits on the northern edge of San José del Cabo, roughly four kilometers from the town’s tourist center and the hotel zone along the Transpeninsular Highway.
Subsequent raids took place in the Monterreal neighborhood and the area known as La Ballena. Monterreal is a working-class residential zone west of downtown San José del Cabo. La Ballena lies farther north, closer to the rural outskirts. These are not tourist areas, but they sit along commuting routes that many residents, including foreign residents who live in planned communities on the city’s periphery, use daily.
Authorities reported the arrest of suspected instigators of violence during the raids. They also located properties allegedly used as safe houses for criminal activity. The seizure of more than a dozen long guns and over 100 improvised explosive devices points to a significant operational cell, not a minor outpost.
If you live in or commute through the San José del Cabo corridor, the practical effects are straightforward: expect continued military checkpoints, especially on roads leading north out of town. Patrols by soldiers and members of Mexico’s National Guard have been visible on Boulevard Antonio Mijares and along Highway 1. These checkpoints are routine during active operations and typically involve vehicle inspections. Keep identification handy, stay calm, and avoid photographing military personnel or equipment.
Reports of U.S. Negotiations Add Uncertainty
Complicating the picture, the Los Angeles Times reported in recent months that U.S. authorities may be in negotiations with Iván Archivaldo and Jesús Alfredo Guzmán Salazar. No agreement has been publicly announced by officials from either country. If such talks are underway, they could affect the duration and intensity of Mexico’s military campaign in Los Cabos. A negotiated surrender, similar to Joaquín Guzmán López’s in 2024, could defuse the immediate threat. But it could also leave a power vacuum that rival factions or local criminal groups would rush to fill.
Baja California Sur Governor Víctor Manuel Castro Cosío has not made detailed public comments about the operations as of this writing. State law enforcement agencies have participated in the raids alongside federal forces.
The next phase of operations will likely focus on financial networks, not just weapons caches. Disrupting safe houses and seizing guns weakens a cartel cell’s capacity for violence, but the deeper question is whether authorities will pursue the real estate holdings, shell companies, and bank accounts that made Los Cabos valuable to Los Chapitos in the first place. The federal campaign is ongoing, with no announced end date. This story was originally reported by ZETA Tijuana and El Financiero.