Former Mexican governor arrested on illicit fuel scheme charges

Mexican federal agents arrested a former governor on fuel smuggling charges in the latest push from authorities to crack down on a criminal racket that has cost state coffers billions of dollars in lost tax revenue.

Ernesto Ruffo, the former governor of Baja California, was detained as part of an investigation into a company federal prosecutors say he founded. Ruffo faces organized crime and smuggling charges, according to a Thursday post on X from the attorney general's office.

Ruffo served as governor of the U.S.-Mexico border state in the 1990s as a member of the conservative National Action Party, or PAN. He's a major stakeholder in fuel importer Ingemar, according to a report from local newspaper El Financiero. The PAN is currently the largest opposition party to the ruling Morena party of President Claudia Sheinbaum, who has pushed to eradicate rampant fuel smuggling.

The former governor did not immediately respond to a request for comment, but last year he denied that Ingemar had any involvement in fuel trafficking, according to local outlet Radio Formula.

Baja California, just south of the U.S. state of California, is home to the bustling Mexican border city of Tijuana, a major manufacturing center and transit point between the two countries.

Illicit fuel smugglers often mislabel gasoline and diesel cargoes as products like industrial lubricants that aren't subject to a hefty import tax, and then profit from selling the contraband fuel at below market prices.

Since last year, police have arrested customs agents, business owners and navy officers, including a former navy rear admiral who was tracked down in Argentina. The lucrative criminal scheme has also implicated Mexico's powerful drug cartels and put a spotlight on Morena, after its founder - former President Andrés Manuel López Obrador - put the navy in charge of the nation's ports in a bid to combat corruption.

Sheinbaum's government has touted progress combating the criminal racket. Her top customs administrator announced as much as $10.9 billion in recovered tax revenue last year because of efforts to stop illegal fuel imports.

For decades, Mexico has been highly dependent on gasoline and diesel imports, mostly from U.S. suppliers, though domestic production of motor fuels has grown in recent years.

Ruffo's arrest could contribute to a simmering political controversy affecting the current governor of Baja California, Marina del Pilar Ávila. She's been in the spotlight in recent days becaue of the dissemination of audio recordings in which she allegedly asks to collaborate with the FBI on security matters. Ávila, a Morena member, disclosed that her U.S. visa was revoked last year. The disclosure came amid a push by the U.S. to target alleged corruption linked to Mexican cartels. Ávila has denied any such involvement.

Sheinbaum has also downplayed her case, stating that it's not clear who's speaking in the recordings.

Another Morena governor, Rubén Rocha Moya, is facing accusations from U.S. prosecutors over suspected ties to major drug traffickers in his homestate of Sinaloa. Rocha Moya has also denied any wrongdoing, though he has taken a temporary leave of absence from his post as the investigation continues.

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