CNN broke a story on May 12 reporting that CIA operations officers facilitated an assassination of a high-ranking Sinaloa cartel leader, Francisco Beltran "El Payin," in Mexico on March 28, citing unnamed sources familiar with the campaign. CNN also reported that since 2025, CIA personnel inside Mexico have directly participated in assassination attacks on mid-level cartel leaders, with the lethality of the operations ramping up.

A CIA spokesperson told CNN that its May 12 report was "false and salacious reporting that serves as nothing more than a PR campaign for the cartels and puts American lives at risk." In response to the CNN reporting, Omar Garcia Harfuch, Mexico's security secretary, posted on X, "The Government of Mexico categorically rejects any version that seeks to normalize, justify, or suggest the existence of lethal, covert, or unilateral operations by foreign agencies on national territory." The reporting follows the death of two CIA members in a car crash in April in Mexico's Chihuahua state during an operation against cartels operating in the area.