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The appearance of Mexican flags in the L.A. riots is exactly what it appears to be: a declaration of war by a foreign power.
John Daniel Davidson writes in the Federalist, "There’s a lot to say about the rioting and mayhem underway in Los Angeles right now, including the striking prevalence of Mexican flags among the rioters. Iconic images have been circulating online for days of masked men waving Mexico’s flag amid burning vehicles and wreckage, giving the riots a decidedly sinister flavor, as though all this is at least partly the work of foreign powers attempting to undermine the sovereignty of the United States."
Could that be true?
We've seen and heard Rep. Maxine Waters telling CNN's Wolf Blitzer there's nothing happening, saying she was "surprised at the way that the [LA] police were describing all of this."
"There had been no violence where anybody that was protesting hit anybody, shot anybody, threatened anybody. Nothing had happened," she said, until Trump.
Let's take a closer look at what is "not happening."
Be informed, not misled.
There has been a lot of speculation about who is really behind the riots in LA. Riots that are now moving into San Francisco and other leftist-run cities.
Undoubtedly, several different interests are using the riots to advance their hatred against our country. But it seems Mexico is the worst actor of all.
Danielson says, "In fact, that’s partially true, and it deserves some unpacking. Much of the debate and commentary in recent days has centered on the Trump administration’s response to the crisis, deploying the National Guard and the Marines to restore order in parts of L.A., and the reactions of California Democratic leaders like Gov. Gavin Newsom and L.A. mayor Karen Bass, who are essentially arguing that law enforcement itself is the problem. Others have speculated on various leftists groups that are in all likelihood funding and organizing these riots, similar to how BLM organized in the summer of 2020, in hopes they will spread to every major city."
"But there’s another political player in this drama that’s gotten much less attention: the Mexican government’s ruling MORENA Party under the leadership of President Claudia Sheinbaum," Danielson says.
via The Federalist:
The first thing to understand about MORENA and the Mexican political establishment is that it’s essentially a criminal enterprise that has, over the past decade, merged with the country’s major cartels. Mexico essentially lost the drug war that began in 2006, and since at least 2013 the state has been so thoroughly infiltrated by the cartels, particularly Sinaloa, that today it’s difficult to tell where one stops and the other begins.
The cartels, of course, are not just drug-trafficking organizations anymore. During the Biden administration, they figured out how to monetize illegal immigration, which became a major source of income for their organizations and networks. Those networks now include elements of the [Guardia Nacional and Instituto Nacional de Migración], the country’s federal immigration authority, both of which were key players in the cartels’ migrant-trafficking operations.
All of that is by way of brief background. On Sunday afternoon, responding to the riots over the weekend, Sheinbaum said Mexican nationals living in the U.S. are “heroes” and denounced President Trump’s attempts to enforce federal immigration law.
“We disagree with this approach to the migration phenomenon,” Sheinbaum said Sunday during a press conference, as reported by the Daily Mail. “It’s not about raids or violence, but rather working on a comprehensive reform that takes into account the Mexicans on the other side of the border,” she added. “That is our position, always a call for peace, to not exacerbate any form of violent protest.”
Sheinbaum added that Mexican nationals in the U.S. are “not criminals” but “good, honest men and women who left to seek a better life for themselves and to support their families.”
In other words, the president of Mexico has sided with the rioters waving Mexican flags over and against federal authorities attempting to enforce U.S. immigration law on American soil. (The irony here is that Mexico does not allow foreign nationals to engage in any political activities in Mexico, including protests.)
That’s bad enough in its own right, but even if Sheinbaum had not said anything on Sunday, the appearance of so many Mexican flags amid the rioting, together with a long-standing pattern of behavior by the ruling Mexican regime, raises serious questions about the role Mexican officialdom is playing in America’s immigration wars.
The enemy within.
Mexico’s president-elect just said: “If necessary, we’ll mobilize. We don’t want taxes on remittances from our fellow countrymen. From the U.S. to Mexico.”
— Arne aus den Ruthen (@arnemx) June 8, 2025
A head of state openly calling for protests in the U.S. This is unprecedented. pic.twitter.com/JqFETt5NKr
And now we have protests — and riots — in L.A. over an issue that intersects directly with the interests of Mexico’s ruling politico-narco class. Simply put, the Mexican flags flying in the streets of L.A. are not simply protest emblems or symbols of pride in one’s heritage, as the New York Times laughably said over the weekend. The flags are rather an indication of an entire network of political operatives that MORENA has maintained inside the U.S. for years, first under former Mexican President (and MORENA founder) Andrés Manuel López Obrador, popularly known as AMLO, and now under Sheinbaum, his successor.
When the New York Times reported in February 2024 on the very robust connections between López Obrador and the powerful Sinaloa drug cartel, a group of “protesters” showed up days later outside the Times' offices waving signs and shouting, “AMLO, you’re not alone.”
President Biden apparently did not see- or want to see- the "robust connections" between Obrador and the powerful Sinaloa drug cartel.
The Times reported:
American law enforcement officials spent years looking into allegations that allies of Mexico’s president, Andrés Manuel López Obrador, met with and took millions of dollars from drug cartels after he took office, according to U.S. records and three people familiar with the matter.
The inquiry, which has not been previously reported, uncovered information pointing to potential links between powerful cartel operatives and Mexican advisers and officials close to the president while he governed the country.
But the United States never opened a formal investigation into Mr. López Obrador, and the officials involved ultimately shelved the inquiry.
The Texas Public Policy Foundation has reported that the Mexican regime has become increasingly hostile to American sovereignty, repeatedly threatening to interfere in U.S. elections and target American lawmakers for attempting to secure the border and fight the cartels. The increasingly inflammatory rhetoric of the Mexican state has become, in TPPF’s estimation, “normative,” and “demonstrates the Mexican government’s willingness to wield political influence over Mexican and Hispanic populations in the United States.”
If the cartels are terrorist organizations, Mexico is their state sponsor. What this means is that the cartel-state partnership in Mexico has a vested interest in ensuring the Trump administration is unable to carry out its plans to secure the border.
As Jackie Gleason used to say: "NOOOW I get it."
Takeaway
National sovereignty is God's plan for His purposes.
The Scriptures make it clear that national sovereignty, including clearly defined borders, is God’s idea. In Acts 17:26, we read, “And he made from one man every nation of mankind to live on all the face of the earth, having determined allotted periods and the boundaries of their dwelling place.”
Two things, we are told, are under God’s sovereign control: how long a nation lasts, and where its borders are. The verb translated “having determined” is the Greek verb “horizo,” from which we get the word “horizon.” It means “to mark out, to define.” So God has marked out and defined the borders of each country.
Our southern border is there by God’s design. To disregard it, to treat it as if it were not there, to regard it as something not worth respecting and defending, is an insult to the God who put it there for our benefit.
The bulk of the second half of Joshua records the Promised Land being divided among the 12 tribes. What is striking is how thorough and detailed the description of each tribal boundary is. In Joshua 15, the word “boundary” is used no less than 15 times to describe the perimeter of Judah.
For instance, here’s the description of the southern boundary: “It goes out southward of the ascent of Akrabbim, passes along to Zin, and goes up south of Kadesh-barnea, along by Hezron, up to Addar, turns about to Karak, passes along to Azmon, goes out by the Brook of Egypt and comes to its end at the sea. This shall be your southern boundary” (Joshua 15:3-4). Such detailed delineations go on for chapter after chapter.
Even regarding private property, curses were pronounced on anyone who moved a boundary marker, a stone which delineated the perimeter of privately owned land. Borders, boundaries, and property lines clearly matter to God.
That such national boundaries are to be respected is made plain by no less a personage than Moses himself. In a largely forgotten passage, Numbers 20:14-21, we read that Moses sought permission from the king of Edom to cross his border and pass through his land. When permission was refused, Moses didn’t force his way in; he respected the king’s decision and went around Edom to the east.
Moses couched his original request this way: “Please let us pass through your land. We will not pass through field or vineyard, or drink water from a well...we will not turn aside to the right hand or to the left until we have passed through your territory.”
The king’s response? “You shall not pass through.” Moses tries a second time to secure an entrance visa. “We will go up by the highway, and if we drink of your water, I and my livestock, then I will pay for it. Let me only pass through on foot, nothing more.”
The king of Edom was utterly impervious to this plea for so much as a tourist visa. “You shall not pass through.” How did Moses react to this denial of permission to immigrate into and through the sovereign territory of another nation? Did he barge ahead anyway? Try to sneak in under the cover of darkness? Did he launch a military strike to secure passage? Nope. “Thus Edom refused to give Israel passage through his territory, so Israel turned away from him.”
The lesson? Each nation’s sovereignty is marked by its border, and each nation has the moral right to decide who will be given permission to enter its sovereign territory. Moses recognized this, and so should we. The only exception is under circumstances of a just war.
The bottom line is that borders are biblical and are created by God’s sovereign design. And they are to be respected by everyone.
Be Informed. Be Discerning. Be Vigilant. Be Engaged. Be Bold. Be Prayerful.
