The United States has formally designated Colombia’s Clan del Golfo crime gang, currently regarded as the country’s largest illegal armed group, as a Foreign Terrorist Organization (FTO), according to a notice posted on the U.S. Treasury Department’s website. The move is part of a broader effort by the Trump administration to begin designating criminal groups in Latin America as terrorist organizations, raising the cost for anyone who provides them support and targeting networks that Washington says move both drugs and migrants into the United States.
The gang, also known as the Gulf Clan, has been active for decades in cocaine trafficking, moving shipments from Colombia-the world’s largest producer of the drug-to markets in the United States and Europe. Based in Colombia’s northern Urabá region, the group also plays a key role in smuggling migrants through the Darién Gap, the dense jungle corridor connecting Colombia and Panama.
In recent years, the Clan del Golfo has attempted to rebrand itself as the Gaitanist Army of Colombia, but it is not widely seen as having concrete political aims. The Biden administration previously sanctioned top leaders of the group, extending existing U.S. pressure on its leadership. In a statement announcing the new FTO designation, U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio called the Clan del Golfo a “violent and powerful criminal organization” whose main revenue comes from cocaine trafficking and which is responsible for terrorist attacks in Colombia.
The designation came within hours of President Donald Trump signing an executive order classifying the synthetic opioid fentanyl as a “weapon of mass destruction,” part of a twin-track campaign that includes lethal strikes on suspected drug-smuggling boats in the Caribbean and Pacific. More than 90 people have been killed in those maritime strikes, which some legal experts argue may breach international law. Trump has argued that such actions save American lives by preventing fentanyl shipments-an opioid estimated to be 50 times more powerful than heroin-from reaching U.S. shores, even though officials have not presented evidence that the destroyed vessels carried fentanyl rather than cocaine.
The Clan del Golfo now joins three other Colombian organizations on the U.S. FTO list: the National Liberation Army (ELN) and two dissident factions that split from the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC) after the 2016 peace agreement with Bogotá. The new U.S. designation follows a landmark agreement in which Colombian President Gustavo Petro’s government reached an understanding with the Clan del Golfo over steps toward disarmament in areas under its control. Petro campaigned on a promise of “total peace,” but talks with many armed groups have stalled or broken down more than three years into his term.
Under the FTO listing, any assets the Clan del Golfo holds in U.S. financial institutions are frozen, and individuals-including U.S. citizens-who knowingly provide “material support” to the group can be prosecuted. The designation is expected to complicate the Colombian government’s negotiations with the group, which reportedly included an understanding that members would not face extradition. Petro has so far not publicly responded to the U.S. move, but relations between him and the Trump administration are described as acrimonious, with Petro criticizing U.S. maritime strikes as “murder” and Rubio labeling the Colombian president a “lunatic.”
The escalation comes amid wider regional tension. Trump has repeatedly warned that “strikes on land” against “narco‑terrorists” could follow maritime operations, pointing to both Venezuela and Colombia and referencing another designated FTO, the alleged Venezuelan Cartel of the Suns. While U.S. officials link these efforts to the opioid crisis, which caused more than 110,000 drug-related deaths in 2023, experts note that neither Colombia nor Venezuela produces fentanyl and have questioned the focus on these countries. Mexico’s President Claudia Sheinbaum has criticized the fentanyl WMD designation, arguing that the root causes of drug use must be addressed and warning of possible unintended consequences for the legitimate medical use of fentanyl in hospitals.
