Mexico’s president, Andrés Manuel López Obrador, on Friday said he personally ordered the release of one of the sons of notorious drug lord Joaquín “El Chapo” Guzmán, after his brief detention during a military operation. Scenes of mayhem during the operation caused López Obrador’s government considerable embarrassment in October as security forces briefly captured Ovidio Guzmán only to let him go hours later as the security forces were overwhelmed by cartel forces. Likely tipped off ahead of the operation, hundreds of heavily armed gunmen from the Sinaloa cartel poured into Culiacán, a city of a million people. An hours-long siege ensued, as the cartel gunmen erected flaming roadblocks and unloaded bursts of gunfire in the streets in a coordinated effort to free the younger Guzmán. But the aborted arrest – and the chaos that it unleashed – prompted accusations that the government had simply folded in the face of cartel firepower, and cast further doubt on the president’s efforts to overhaul Mexico’s security strategy. López Obrador had previously said his security cabinet made the call to release Ovidio, a decision he said he endorsed to protect terrorized residents from the crossfire between cartel henchmen and security forces. Friday was the first time the president openly acknowledged having given the order himself. “So as not to put the population at risk ... I ordered that this operation be stopped and that this alleged criminal be released,” López Obrador said at a news conference. López Obrador added that a couple days later Donald Trump offered to help crack down on the cartel, but Mexico did not accept it. The US continues to seek Ovidio’s extradition. Despite López Obrador’s promises to tame spiraling violence with policies focused on relieving rampant poverty and youth unemployment, homicides in Mexico have climbed to record levels during the first four months of this year. In 2019, the president’s first full year in office, homicides hit an all-time high. Reuters contributed reporting