MEXICO CITY — Andrés Manuel López Beltrán addressed a public letter to President Donald Trump late Thursday, saying the United States had cancelled his visa without legal justification and accusing two senior State Department officials of driving the decision. He named Secretary of State Marco Rubio and Deputy Secretary Christopher Landau as the officials he accused of ordering the revocation.
"There is no reason whatsoever to justify such an arrogant action," López Beltrán wrote in the letter, which he published on social media. He denied any wrongdoing, writing that the officials hold "no evidence against me regarding any immoral or criminal act."
He called the move "a crude and perverse act" and argued that U.S. officials routinely target Mexican politicians by attaching labels to them—"communists," "threats to U.S. security" or "narco-terrorists"—without substantiation.
The State Department did not publicly respond to his allegations. The U.S. Embassy in Mexico City told the Mexican outlet Milenio that visa records are confidential under American law and that it cannot discuss details of individual cases.
López Beltrán, 39, occupies a prominent place in Mexican politics. He stepped down recently from leading the left-wing Morena party, a position he had held after being elected the party's secretary of organization in September 2024—weeks before his father left the presidency. He is expected to seek a seat in the Chamber of Deputies in next year's elections.
For most of his father's six-year administration, which ran from 2018 to 2024, López Beltrán kept his distance from party affairs and ran a chocolate business. His move into Morena's organizational leadership came only in the final stretch of his father's term.
His father, Andrés Manuel López Obrador, founded Morena in 2011 and governed Mexico for six years before handing power to Claudia Sheinbaum, who now holds the presidency. Morena currently commands decisive majorities in both chambers of Mexico's Congress.
Sheinbaum responded to the visa revocation at her Friday morning press briefing. She said she had no knowledge of any Mexican prosecutorial investigation into López Beltrán and described the action in direct terms. "This amounts to interference in Mexican politics," she said. "I see no other reason for it."
The cancellation fits a pattern that has developed across the political spectrum in Mexico. The Trump administration has revoked visas held by multiple Mexican officials, framing the actions as part of a broad effort to cut off individuals with ties to drug cartels. Washington has not publicly explained the specific grounds in individual cases, including this one.
Sheinbaum has maintained a careful posture toward the Trump administration. She has pledged cooperation on cartel enforcement and cross-border crime while defending Mexican sovereignty against what she describes as foreign interference. She has accepted collaboration with U.S. intelligence agencies but has reportedly turned down Trump's offers of direct U.S. military operations on Mexican territory.
Bilateral tension over law enforcement has sharpened in recent months. Last month, the head of the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration said Sheinbaum's government has ties to organized crime—a claim she rejected outright. That assertion echoes a frequent talking point from Trump. In April, Sheinbaum also pushed back against U.S. charges filed against Sinaloa Governor Rubén Rocha, a fellow Morena member, on drug trafficking and weapons counts. She argued the indictment lacks evidence and that criminal investigations involving Mexican officials belong to Mexican prosecutors, not Washington.
The López Beltrán case adds another Morena-linked figure to the list of Mexican politicians whose U.S. visas have been pulled. The State Department's standard position is that it will not discuss individual visa decisions.
