On Monday night, the FAA did something it has never done on the southern border. It classified the airspace over El Paso, Texas, and eastern New Mexico as “National Defense Airspace” — the same designation used to protect the White House and Air Force One. Any aircraft that violated it could be shot down. No warning shots. No polite radio calls. Deadly force, authorized.
The reason? Mexican cartel drones crossed into American airspace. And the U.S. military took them out.
What We Know
Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy confirmed that a cartel drone incursion triggered the shutdown. “The FAA and DOW acted swiftly to address a cartel drone incursion,” Duffy posted on social media. “The threat has been neutralized.”
Reports indicate multiple cartel-operated drones breached American airspace, and the Department of Defense used electronic warfare measures to bring them down. The El Paso NOTAM — a formal Notice to Airmen — initially imposed a ten-day flight restriction covering a 10-nautical-mile radius around the city, from the ground up to 18,000 feet. That restriction was lifted within hours after the threat was neutralized. A similar NOTAM over Santa Teresa, New Mexico, remains active for the full ten days.
And here’s the part that should make your coffee go cold: virtually every federal agency involved has gone silent. Breitbart reached out to the Department of Transportation, Homeland Security, Customs and Border Protection, and others. No response. The airspace got locked down, the military scrambled, deadly force was authorized over an American city — and nobody wants to talk about it.
The Drone Problem Nobody Wanted to Discuss
This didn’t come out of nowhere. Mexican cartels have been operating drones along the border for years. Surveillance drones tracking Border Patrol movements. Drug trafficking drones carrying payloads across the Rio Grande. And yes — weaponized drones. The same technology that’s reshaping battlefields in Ukraine and the Middle East is now buzzing over the Texas border.
The difference between a cartel surveillance drone and a weaponized one is a zip tie and a payload. The technology is cheap, accessible, and getting more sophisticated by the month. Cartels that generate billions in annual revenue aren’t shopping at Best Buy for their equipment. They’re running drone programs that would embarrass some countries’ militaries.
And until Monday night, the U.S. response has been… what, exactly? Years of reports. Years of warnings. Years of Breitbart Texas documenting cartel drone operations while Washington pretended the border was under control.
The Response That Should’ve Come Sooner
Credit where it’s due — the response was fast and decisive. Electronic warfare to down the drones. Deadly-force authorization in case more came. Airspace locked down within minutes. That’s the kind of response you get when the people in charge actually take border security seriously.
But it raises an uncomfortable question. If the military can neutralize cartel drones in hours, why has this threat been allowed to develop for years? The cartels didn’t suddenly discover Amazon Prime drone delivery last week. They’ve been running aerial operations across the border while previous administrations studied the problem, formed committees, and presumably held very productive Zoom calls about it.
What Nobody’s Saying
The silence from federal agencies is deafening. A deadly-force airspace lockdown over a major American city should generate press conferences, briefings, and congressional hearings. Instead, we’re getting crickets and a two-sentence social media post from the Transportation Secretary.
That silence tells you one of two things. Either the threat was more serious than anyone wants to publicly acknowledge, or the response involved capabilities the government doesn’t want to discuss. Maybe both. Electronic warfare over a U.S. city isn’t something you casually mention at a press briefing.
The Santa Teresa NOTAM is still active for ten days. That means the military isn’t confident this is over. Whatever the cartels sent across the border on Monday night, the people in charge are expecting more.
Where This Is Headed
The southern border just became an active airspace threat. Not hypothetically. Not in some Pentagon planning document. Right now, in real time, over a city of 700,000 people.
The cartels have drones. They’ve demonstrated willingness to fly them into American airspace. And the U.S. military just demonstrated willingness to shoot them down.
This is the new border reality. It’s not just about walls and checkpoints and immigration courts anymore. It’s about air defense over American soil. It’s about electronic warfare capabilities deployed not against a foreign military, but against narco-traffickers with the budget of a small nation and the morality of a plague.
Anyone who still thinks the border is just an “immigration issue” wasn’t paying attention Monday night. This is a national security crisis with propellers.