XPost: or.politics, alt.politics.trump, alt.fan.rush-limbaugh   
   From: biased@nowhere.invalid   
      
    wsj.com   
   A Venezuelan Gang Is Expanding Its Deadly Reach to the U.S.   
   Juan Forero   
      
   Updated Sept. 12, 2024 12:41 am ET   
      
   U.S. law-enforcement officials had watched with alarm the spread of a   
   Venezuelan gang known for dismembering rivals from Chile to Colombia. But   
   the gang, known as the Tren de Aragua, seemed contained in Latin America.   
      
   Then late last year, Anthony Salisbury, a top Homeland Security official,   
   got a call. "Hey, have you heard of the Tren de Aragua?" a Texas official   
   asked.   
      
   "Please don't tell me you've seen them," Salisbury responded.   
      
   In fact, the colleague said, Tren de Aragua members were operating in   
   Texas. Now, Salisbury said, there are also dozens of criminal cases   
   involving the gang in Miami, where he is based.   
      
   "They expanded fast in Latin America," he said, "and they're expanding   
   fast here."   
      
   Founded in a Venezuelan prison where it ran a zoo, swimming pool, disco,   
   restaurant and bar, the Tren de Aragua has grown into a fearsome   
   transnational criminal force in less than a decade-"MS-13 on steroids," as   
   one federal official put it, referring to the Central American gang that   
   is entrenched in many U.S. communities. The specter of crime caused by   
   immigrants has become a major theme in the presidential campaign, with   
   former President Donald Trump calling out "migrant crime" repeatedly.   
      
   Federal crime data show homicides and other crimes have dropped-and that   
   the U.S. is far safer than it used to be. The gang isn't a household name,   
   but its activities are a source of fascination on social media. "I think   
   the Tren de Aragua in the U.S. could help elect Trump," said Michael   
   Shifter, a senior fellow at the Inter-American Dialogue think tank in   
   Washington.   
      
   Just as the Italian mafia followed the 19th century wave of immigration to   
   the U.S., Tren de Aragua has emigrated alongside nearly eight million   
   Venezuelans fleeing the reign of strongman Nicolas Maduro. Everywhere Tren   
   de Aragua has set up, investigators say, it has established   
   drug-distribution networks, extortion rackets and prostitution rings,   
   preying on Venezuelans as they make new homes elsewhere in Latin America.   
      
   American officials fear the same pattern emerging in the U.S., where more   
   than 700,000 Venezuelans have settled in the past four years. Tren de   
   Aragua members are suspects in the shooting of two New York police   
   officers, the killing of a former Venezuelan police officer in South   
   Florida, and crimes from Chicago to Texas, law-enforcement authorities   
   said.   
      
   In all, there are now more than 100 investigations in the U.S. involving   
   suspected members of Tren de Aragua, said a high-ranking Immigration and   
   Customs Enforcement official.   
      
   The Treasury Department imposed sanctions on the group in July, and the   
   State Department has offered up to $12 million as a reward for information   
   leading to the arrest of three of the group's leaders.   
      
   The Tren de Aragua-which means the Train of Aragua, the Venezuelan state   
   in the center of the country-first relocated to neighboring Colombia   
   before putting down roots in Peru, Chile, Ecuador and other countries,   
   law-enforcement authorities and crime researchers say. The gang is looking   
   for better opportunities than those in Venezuela, where the economy has   
   capsized under Maduro's rule, leading to hyperinflation and poverty made   
   worse by U.S. sanctions.   
      
   Tren de Aragua members have found particularly lucrative territory in New   
   York City, authorities said. They are accused of robberies at Macy's,   
   Sunglass Hut and upscale stores, and moped-riding gang members also have   
   been blamed for snatching phones from unsuspecting pedestrians, said   
   Joseph Kenny, chief of detectives for the New York Police Department.   
      
   "It was like a wave of crime like we had never seen before," Kenny said.   
   "They can come here and make their money very quickly."   
      
   Members sport tattoos, favoring depictions of a train, the No. 23 worn by   
   NBA legend Michael Jordan and the Nike swoosh. They peddle drugs along   
   Queens' bustling Roosevelt Avenue but don't extort small Venezuelan   
   businesses like they do elsewhere, Kenny said.   
      
   "They don't have to nickel and dime a mom-and-pop store for five dollars a   
   week for protection when they can walk into Macy's and steal $7,000 worth   
   of clothing and resell it out on the street," he said.   
      
   Tren de Aragua members are difficult to identify and track because they   
   have entered the U.S. through the southern border and share migration   
   paperwork among themselves, Kenny said. It is difficult for police to   
   determine a suspect's criminal history because the U.S. doesn't have   
   diplomatic ties with Venezuela.   
      
   "They could be wanted for murder in Venezuela," Kenny said. "We wouldn't   
   know that."   
      
   Tren de Aragua expanded quickly from its origins in Venezuela's Tocoron   
   prison, trafficking drugs, contracting hits and extorting businesses   
   outside the penitentiary walls-activities allowed by Venezuelan prison   
   authorities, law-enforcement officials said.   
      
   Venezuelan government officials didn't respond to requests for comment.   
   Foreign Minister Yvan Gil this year called Tren de Aragua a figment of the   
   media's imagination.   
      
   The group branched into neighboring Colombia around 2018, setting up in   
   the teeming working-class neighborhoods of Bogota's south side, where   
   gangs battle it out to sell drugs, run bordellos and demand a monthly   
   "vaccine," or protection payment, from businesses, investigators say. Soon   
   Tren de Aragua was dismembering rivals, leaving the remains in garbage   
   bags on the streets.   
      
   Selling cocaine, marijuana and a potent cocaine derivative called bazuco   
   is the gang's main business. It also extorts businesses, killing the   
   employees of stores whose owners don't pay up.   
      
   One recent afternoon, German Murillo, a businessman organizing other store   
   owners in Bogota to report Tren de Aragua activities, sat in a cafe in   
   front of a supermarket that the group targeted last year. When the owner   
   refused to pay the "vaccine," a gunman fatally shot a worker from behind   
   as he arranged produce.   
      
   "They extort restaurants, small shops, anyone," Murillo said. "It's an   
   organization that's involved in everything."   
      
   Tren de Aragua found an inviting environment in Chile, known for its   
   relative affluence and low crime.   
      
   "The gang looks for earnings," said Ronna Rísquez, a Venezuelan journalist   
   and author of a book on Tren de Aragua. "In Chile, there were   
   possibilities."   
      
   Chile didn't have powerful drug gangs, leaving the field wide open for   
   Tren de Aragua. The gang's methods have shocked Chilean officials.   
      
   Carolina Toha, Chile's interior minister, described how the gang carries   
   heavy weaponry, shows special cruelty when settling scores, and commits   
   crimes authorities hadn't seen in the past. In February, the Tren de   
      
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