As she was driving out of party headquarters, five vans with dark‑tinted windows cut her off. She doesn’t remember how many men got out, but they were dressed in black, their faces covered with balaclavas, and they carried rifles. From that moment on, everything becomes hazier. They pushed her into the back seat of one of the vehicles, blindfolded her, and began driving in circles around Culiacán, the capital of the Mexican state Sinaloa. There was no physical or verbal abuse, just veiled threats like “we’ve got half of Culiacán here” or “we can take you home whenever you want.” Nearly nine hours later, as the sun began to rise over the soft hills surrounding the city, Paola Gárate had her blindfold removed and was released near a supermarket. It was Sunday, and in just a few hours, the polls would open to choose Sinaloa’s next governor. Dazed but relieved, that was how the election day began for the president of the Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI) in Sinaloa.

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© Nayeli Cruz (EL PAÍS)

© Nayeli Cruz (EL PAÍS)

© Nayeli Cruz (EL PAÍS)

© Nayeli Cruz (EL PAÍS)

© Nayeli Cruz (EL PAÍS)

© Nayeli Cruz (EL PAÍS)

A major crack has appeared in the least expected place: the newly established foundation of the security relationship between Mexico and the United States, a sacred space during the 14 months that Claudia Sheinbaum and Donald Trump have spent at the helm of their respective governments. The political crisis in Mexico stemming from the presence of CIA agents on the ground in Chihuahua, coupled with the U.S. indictment of a governor and a senator in Sinaloa on drug trafficking charges, are the backdrop for a rupture whose magnitude and consequences are yet to be fully realized. The political chess game is progressing; bishops and knights are getting ready. A false move by either side could further complicate the situation.

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© Henry Romero (REUTERS)

Adrián Valdez rides his horse slowly into a clearing on the bank of the Rio Grande — or the Río Bravo, depending on which side of it you’re on. At 50, with a gray mustache and cowboy boots with spurs that mark the pace of his brown-and-white horse, he doesn’t seem to know what hurry is. Time bows to him and his animal. But that’s only because this Tuesday he has no job to be at. For virtually his entire adult life though, it has been two that have kept him and his family afloat.

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Photos and video:

Aggi Garduño

Design and layout:

Mónica Juárez Martín and Ángel Hernández

Visual editing:

Mónica González

© Aggi Garduño

© Aggi Garduño

© Aggi Garduño

© Aggi Garduño

© Aggi Garduño

© Aggi Garduño

© Aggi Garduño

The Voting Rights Act, one of the most enduring legacies of the civil rights era, prohibited racist politicians in the southern U.S. states from using underhanded tactics to suppress the votes of Black citizens. Last Wednesday, the Supreme Court’s conservative supermajority completed the task of dismantling that law, which had already been severely weakened by two previous rulings. The new decision declares the design of Louisiana’s majority-Black 2nd District unconstitutional and opens the door to a potentially Republican-friendly change in democratic rules in other Southern states.

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© Matt Rourke (AP/LaPresse)

On Christmas Day 2024, Angela Della Valle was at the Saint Thomas airport with her husband Carlos and their son Alessandro, waiting for their flight back to Pennsylvania after a few days of vacation. At one point, she turned around and Carlos was gone. A Customs and Border Protection agent had detained him for being undocumented. The Illegal Immigration Reform and Immigrant Responsibility Act (IIRIRA) had prevented Carlos from legalizing his immigration status, despite his more than 20 years of marriage to Angela, who was born in the United States.

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© Cedida

Scammers targeting U.S. victims have perfected their methods. They pretend to be relatives in distress, lawyers about to file lawsuits, salespeople with incredible offers, or feared immigration officers. They’ve gone so far as to open call centers, develop strategies, write scripts, hire English-speaking operators, and demand ever-increasing results from them. They also use artificial intelligence and have accomplices who collect and send money. Many have achieved their goals of defrauding people with almost business-like precision.

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© CEDIDA

For months, Venezuela’s Chavista regime prepared to die, but not to emerge badly wounded. Of all the scenarios considered during Donald Trump’s offensive against Nicolás Maduro, the president being captured alive wasn’t on anyone’s radar. “I had never held a pistol or a rifle in my life... and I prepared myself [for] months to face any situation that might arise. But [I didn’t expect] this one,” says a prominent member of the ruling United Socialist Party of Venezuela (PSUV), founded by former president Hugo Chávez, who governed from 1999 until his death in 2013.

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“This is the last trip. I ask for your forgiveness, but get me there quickly.” Elizabet Bueckert whispered these words to her chestnut horse at dusk on January 17, 2026. Her cart sped along the dirt roads of the Orthodox Mennonite colony of La Nueva Esperanza (“The New Hope”), in the rural Argentine province of La Pampa. That day, she had spent hours away from her husband’s house, sheltering with her two young daughters in a shed, attempting to avoid his insults. The 33-year-old woman decided that the moment she had fantasized about so many times had finally arrived.

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Photography:

Anita Pouchard Serra

Design and layout:

Mónica Juárez Martín and Ángel Hernández

Visual editing:

Gladys Serrano and Mónica González

Translation:

Avik Jain Chatlani

© Anita Pouchard Serra (Anita Pouchard Serra / El Pais)

© Anita Pouchard Serra (Anita Pouchard Serra / El Pais)

© Anita Pouchard Serra (Anita Pouchard Serra / El Pais)

© Anita Pouchard Serra (Anita Pouchard Serra / El Pais)

The Bengali writer Amitav Ghosh, 69, says that lifeboat ethics is a racist theory that claims someone already aboard a lifeboat has the right to stop others from climbing in to avoid sinking.

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Its detractors call it the Eye of Sauron, and its defenders, “the guardian of Chihuahua.” The Sentinel Tower is a multi-million-dollar investment, a borderland’s bet on security. It’s the tallest building in Ciudad Juárez, that which best represents the fear of mass surveillance. And this week, it became a new battlefield in the political war between Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum’s left-wing administration and the state government of the right-leaning political party PAN’s Governor Maru Campos. At 25 stories, the tower has come under scrutiny after the brutal car crash in which two CIA agents and two officials who were part of Chihuahua’s State Investigation Agency were killed. The death of the foreign agents, whose presence was unauthorized by the federal government, has led to the latest battle between the Morena administration and one of the few states still governed by an opposition party in Mexico. Since then, there’s been one question on everyone’s minds: how far is Donald Trump’s reach via operatives in Mexico, thanks to the country’s state governments?

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© Andrea Hernández Briceño

© Andrea Hernández Briceño

© Andrea Hernández Briceño

© Andrea Hernández Briceño

© Andrea Hernández Briceño

© Andrea Hernández Briceño

© Andrea Hernández Briceño (EL PAÍS)

© Andrea Hernández Briceño

© Andrea Hernández Briceño

© Andrea Hernández Briceño

© Andrea Hernández Briceño

© Andrea Hernández Briceño

© Andrea Hernández Briceño

© Andrea Hernández Briceño

© Andrea Hernández Briceño

If you see a photograph taken by Petra Collins, it will likely look familiar, even if you don’t specifically associate it with a particular person. The Canadian artist’s work has become a key reference point in Gen Z aesthetics: a pioneering and intimate portrait of the female gaze that addresses taboos and anxieties, from eroticism to violence.

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© Ronan Gallagher / Gucci