Editing Carlos Salinas de Gortari (section)

===Drug trafficking and corruption===
{{Main|Mexican Drug War}}
An issue of importance both domestic and foreign policy is drug trafficking. In the 1980s and early 1990s, Mexico was a transit country for [[cocaine]] produced in Colombia and destined for consumers in the United States. President De la Madrid considered drug trafficking a national security issue and devoted government funding to it. Salinas expanded this funding, but neither president stemmed the growth of trafficking and its impact on Mexico. Drug trafficking is highly lucrative for those involved with it, and Mexico's weak law enforcement and judicial system could not prevent the wide-scale involvement of Mexico's poorly-paid police from being corrupted. The Mexican military to a lesser extent was corrupted, along with politicians, and some journalists. Such corruption undermined the possibility of rule of law and it prevented Mexicans from having trust in the state. A rising level of violence by drug traffickers against the state, witnesses, journalists, and bystanders.<ref>Maria Celila Toro, "Drug Trade" in ''Encyclopedia of Mexico'', Chicago: Fitzroy Dearborn 1997, pp. 419-20.</ref>  The Mexican government did capture and jail some high-level drug mafia leaders, including [[Miguel Ángel Félix Gallardo]] in 1989, whose arrest made visible the extent of law enforcement collusion.<ref>{{cite news |url=https://www.nytimes.com/1989/04/16/world/in-mexico-drug-roots-run-deep.html?pagewanted=1 |title=In Mexico, Drug Roots Run Deep |newspaper=The New York Times |date= 16 April 1989|access-date=24 March 2019|last1= Rohter|first1= Larry}}</ref>