Cartels' nemesis is Mexico's own 'Batman'

No floodlights illuminate the night sky when the citizens of Mexico’s Gotham need a hand. No hot line summons this super-cop from a hidden redoubt.

- BY PATRICK J. MCDONNELL

GERARDO VIEYRA NurPhoto.

OMAR García Harfuch, Mexico's security secretary, emits an aura of competence.

But Mexico does indeed have its own “Batman”: Omar García Harfuch, security czar in the government of President Claudia Sheinbaum.

He acquired the Batman moniker during his days as Mexico City’s crime-busting police chief under then-Mayor Sheinbaum. Like the stalwart Dark Knight, García Harfuch emits the vibe of a vigilant protector who compensates for a lack of superpowers with more cerebral skills — a mix of intelligence, resolve and moxie.

In his current post (official title: secretary of Security and Citizen Protection), García Harfuch is inevitably dispatched to hot spots from the northern border to the southern hinterlands — sites of assassinations, massacres, gang wars and other headline-grabbing incarnations of Mexican mayhem. The script never varies: He vows to snare the bad guys. Arrests follow.

Like his boss, Sheinbaum, the security chief disputes President Trump's assertions that Mexico is “run by" cartels, though he doesn’t deny the widespread sway of organized crime.

“Yes, there is definitely a presence of criminal groups, but [Mexico] is not controlled by the cartels,” García Harfuch, 43, recently told the Mexican daily El Universal.

His stern, just-the-facts Joe Friday recitals of arrests, seizures, drug lab take-downs and other enforcement actions are signature moments at presidential news briefings. García Harfuch — always decked out in suit and tie — transmits an aura of competence, and his media-savvy advisors have burnished his image as an implacable foe of the cartels.

Supporters began calling him Batman, in English, when crime rates dropped precipitously in Mexico City during his tenure as police chief. Supporters even circulated online images of a modified Batman action figure, with “Harfuch” emblazoned on the chest.