President Trump delays calling cartels terrorist groups, what does it mean for El Paso County black market marijuana?

EL PASO COUNTY, Colo. -- On Friday, President Donald Trump announced he would delay designating Mexican cartel groups as terrorist organizations.

CNN reports the push-back came after a request from Mexican President Andres Manuel Lopez.

It's unclear when the designation will come and which cartels will be targeted. However, the President said, "all necessary work has been complete to declare Mexican Cartels terrorist organization. Statutorily, we are ready to do so."

In Colorado, local law enforcement officers have faced their fair share of cartel problems.

The Sheriff's office in El Paso, Teller and Pueblo counties have come into contact with cartel members facilitating black-market marijuana grow operations in their communities.

Teller County Sheriff Jason Mikesell says, "they are a terrorist organization... somebody who is doing kidnappings, moving weapons, drugs, people all those types of things that would designate them anyway."

In 2019, there have been about 70 illegal marijuana busts in El Paso County.

Lt. Paul Mynatt says that one in four county arrests had tie to cartels.

"For everyone we identify there's probably a few we have not, and sometimes they are the glove of a cartel organization," Mynatt said.

Encountering those operations always comes with a higher risk for deputies to engage and eventually eliminate the illegal grow.

"Cartel operations have the tendency to counter-surveil us," he said. "They do things like that which open up a myriad of potential problems for us. They have also been known to hire bodyguards to protect their grow houses."

Mikesell says, "they're organized well-trained, they're well funded."

In 2018, El Paso County Sheriff Bill Elder announced a big push to decrease the number of illegal grows.

Since then, Mynatt says most leave before they can be arrested.

"We go out to grow houses now and they're already gone."

As for calling cartels a terrorist organization, Mynatt explains he's not sure it would make a difference on the law enforcement side.

"They can call them whatever they want to call them. It's going to be business as usual for us."

In Teller County, Sheriff Mikesell explained they aren't completely gone. In fact, they've introduced more narcotics into the Southern Colorado, including fentanyl, heroin and opioids.