2026 started with a horrifying example of generative AI’s potential for abuse. Grok, the AI tool from Elon Musk’s xAI, was used to undress or nudify pictures of people shared on X (formerly Twitter) at an alarming rate. Grok made 3 million sexualized images over a span of 11 days in January, with approximately 23,000 of those containing images of children, according to a study from the Center for Countering Digital Hate.
Now, competitors like OpenAI and Google are stepping up their security to avoid being the next Grok.
Advocates and safety researchers have long been concerned about AI’s ability to create abusive and illegal content. The creation and sharing of nonconsensual intimate imagery, sometimes referred to as revenge porn, was a big problem before AI. Generative AI only makes it quicker, easier, and cheaper for anyone to target and victimize people.
2026 started with a horrifying example of generative AI’s potential for abuse. Grok, the AI tool from Elon Musk’s xAI, was used to undress or nudify pictures of people shared on X (formerly Twitter) at an alarming rate. Grok made 3 million sexualized images over a span of 11 days in January, with approximately 23,000 of those containing images of children, according to a study from the Center for Countering Digital Hate.
Now, competitors like OpenAI and Google are stepping up their security to avoid being the next Grok.
Advocates and safety researchers have long been concerned about AI’s ability to create abusive and illegal content. The creation and sharing of nonconsensual intimate imagery, sometimes referred to as revenge porn, was a big problem before AI. Generative AI only makes it quicker, easier, and cheaper for anyone to target and victimize people.
On Jan. 14, two weeks into the scandal, X’s Safety account confirmed in a post that it would pause Grok’s ability to edit images on the social media app. Grok’s image-generation abilities are still available to paying subscribers in its standalone app and website. X did not respond to multiple requests for comment.
Most major companies have safeguards in place to prevent the kind of wide-scale abuse that we saw was possible with Grok. But cybersecurity is never a solid metal wall of protection; it’s a brick wall that’s constantly undergoing repairs. Here’s how OpenAI and Google have tried to beef up their safety protections to circumvent Grok-like failures.
Read More: AI Slop Is Destroying the Internet. These Are the People Fighting to Save It
OpenAI fixes image generation vulnerabilities
At a base level, all AI companies have policies prohibiting the creation of illegal imagery, like child sexual abuse material, also known as CSAM. Many tech companies have guardrails to prevent the creation of intimate imagery altogether. Grok is the exception, with “spicy” modes for image and video.
Still, anyone intent on creating nonconsensual intimate imagery can try to trick AI models into doing so.
Researchers from Mindgard, a cybersecurity company focused on AI, found a vulnerability in ChatGPT that allowed people to circumvent its guardrails and make intimate images. They used a tactic called “adversarial prompting,” where testers try to poke holes in an AI with specifically crafted instructions. In this case, it was tricking the chatbot’s memory with custom prompts, then copying the nudified style onto images of well-known people.
Mindgard alerted OpenAI of its findings in early February, and the ChatGPT developer confirmed on Feb. 10 — before Mindgard went public with its report — that it had fixed the problem.
“We’re grateful to the researchers who shared their findings,” an OpenAI spokesperson said to CNET and Mindgard. “We moved quickly to fix a bug that allowed the model to generate these images. We value this kind of collaboration and remain focused on strengthening safeguards to keep users safe.”
This process is how cybersecurity often works. Outside red-team researchers like Mindgard test software for weaknesses or workarounds, mimicking strategies that bad actors might use. When they identify security gaps, they alert the software provider so fixes can be deployed.
“Assuming motivated users will not attempt to bypass safeguards is a strategic miscalculation. Attackers iterate. Guardrails must assume persistence,” Mindgard wrote in a blog post.
While tech companies boast about how you can use their AI for any purpose, they also need to make a strong promise that they can prevent AI from being used to enact abuse. For AI image generation, that means having a strong repertoire of prompts that will be refused and kicked back to users.
When OpenAI launched its Sora 2 video model, it promised to be more conservative with its content moderation for this very reason. But it’s important to ensure its moderation practices are consistently effective, not just at a product’s launch. It makes AI safety testing an ongoing process for cybersecurity researchers and AI developers alike.
Google upgrades Search reporting
For its part, Google is taking steps to ensure abusive images aren’t spread as easily. The tech giant simplified its process for requesting the removal of explicit images from Google Search. You can click the three dots in the upper right corner of an image, click report and then tell Google you want the photo removed because it “shows a sexual image of me.” The new changes also let you select multiple images at once and track your reports more easily.
“We hope that this new removal process reduces the burden that victims of nonconsensual explicit imagery face,” the company said in a blog post.
When asked about any further steps the company is taking to prevent AI-enabled abuse, Google pointed CNET to its generative AI prohibited use policy. Google’s policy, like many other tech companies’ fine print, outlaws using AI for illegal or potentially abusive activities, such as creating intimate imagery.
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AI safety is an ongoing challenge. ismagilov/iStock/Getty Images
Bruised by a Supreme Court setback and falling approval ratings, the president has an opportunity to change the narrative ahead.
Here’s the latest.
President Trump, reeling from a major setback on his sweeping tariffs at the Supreme Court and facing the lowest approval ratings of his second term, will deliver his State of the Union address on Tuesday at a pivotal moment in his presidency.
He is expected to highlight what he said was a lengthy list of achievements. But polls show that Americans, by a wide margin, now disapprove of him on what were once his winning issues: the economy and immigration. Republicans are now in danger of losing the House in the upcoming midterm elections, a development that would threaten much of Mr. Trump’s second-term agenda.
Add Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, Democrat of New York, to the list of prominent Democrats who are boycotting Trump’s speech. The list so far includes some 40 lawmakers. We’re still waiting to hear where others, like Nancy Pelosi, the former House speaker, land. Notably, the No. 2 Democrat in the House, Katherine Clark of Massachusetts, is not coming. Representative Al Green, the septuagenarian Texas Democrat who last year was ejected from the chamber during Trump’s speech for shouting and waving his cane, is in the chamber with a homemade cardboard sign that says “Al Green.” His outburst last year, which Republicans eventually censured him for, was largely viewed with frustration by Democrats, who thought it was a childish form of protest.
How The Times reports on the State of the Union.
Tonight is somewhat of a political Super Bowl: President Trump will deliver his State of the Union address to the nation, a tradition that dates to 1790.
“It’s an important moment to see where the president is focused and how he is being received,” said Julie Hirschfeld Davis, The New York Times’s congressional editor, who is helping coordinate coverage of the speech.
Biden laid out the stakes of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine four years ago.
Four years ago, Russia poured over the border into Ukraine, igniting the biggest war in the heart of Europe since the end of World War II. The invasion that began on Feb. 24, 2022, shattered the notion that the world order that followed had banished the days when powerful nations simply took over their weaker neighbors.
Days later, President Joseph R. Biden Jr. laid out the stakes during a State of the Union address and received towering applause, even from Republicans who disliked him and despised his agenda. After all, vowing to support nascent democracies was still in favor in Washington, an idea that crossed party lines.
More than a dozen Epstein victims will attend the speech as lawmakers’ invited guests.
Over a dozen lawmakers are bringing survivors of Jeffrey Epstein’s abuse to President Trump’s State of the Union address on Tuesday night, a statement against the administration’s handling of documents related to the convicted sex offender.
Lawmakers for many years have invited guests to the annual speech as a way of sending pointed messages to the president. A number of Democrats have said they will boycott the speech and attend a rally on the National Mall near the Capitol.
U.S. men’s hockey team arrives for the State of the Union, but the women stay away.
Fresh from winning a gold medal, members of the U.S. men’s hockey team arrived at the White House on Tuesday afternoon, two days after President Trump invited them to visit the residence and then attend his State of the Union speech on Capitol Hill.
The president had excitedly extended the invitation on Sunday by speakerphone, when he placed a call to the equally jazzed F.B.I. director, Kash Patel. Mr. Patel was at the Winter Olympics in Italy, celebrating and spraying beer in the locker room with the men’s team.
More than a dozen Epstein victims will attend the speech as lawmakers’ invited guests.
Over a dozen lawmakers are bringing survivors of Jeffrey Epstein’s abuse to President Trump’s State of the Union address on Tuesday night, a statement against the administration’s handling of documents related to the convicted sex offender.
Lawmakers for many years have invited guests to the annual speech as a way of sending pointed messages to the president. A number of Democrats have said they will boycott the speech and attend a rally on the National Mall near the Capitol.
U.S. men’s hockey team arrives for the State of the Union, but the women stay away.
Fresh from winning a gold medal, members of the U.S. men’s hockey team arrived at the White House on Tuesday afternoon, two days after President Trump invited them to visit the residence and then attend his State of the Union speech on Capitol Hill.
The president had excitedly extended the invitation on Sunday by speakerphone, when he placed a call to the equally jazzed F.B.I. director, Kash Patel. Mr. Patel was at the Winter Olympics in Italy, celebrating and spraying beer in the locker room with the men’s team.
Have you ever thought about how your body turns food into energy? Or just how carefully it has to manage that process?
When we eat, the glucose from our food gets stored in the liver as glycogen. And based on our body’s needs, the liver will convert that glycogen back into glucose so that it can travel through the blood and get to our cells, which turn that glucose into energy.
Meanwhile, our pancreas produces a hormone called insulin whose job is to go into the blood and tell our cells to take in that glucose. That also makes insulin a regulator of our body’s blood sugar levels, preventing the complications that can happen when our levels are too high or too low.
When the pancreas stops producing insulin, glucose doesn’t enter our cells. Instead, it accumulates in the bloodstream. In some people, the pancreas stops making insulin altogether. This condition is known as type 1 diabetes.
While the exact cause is mysterious, we know the disease happens because immune cells target and attack insulin-producing cells in the pancreas called beta cells. As those cells get destroyed, the body stops producing insulin and loses the key regulator of blood sugar levels. That in turn can drive a number of symptoms, including fatigue and weakness.
Over the 20th and 21st centuries, scientists have developed technologies that have made type 1 diabetes treatable. These include meters to check blood glucose levels and pumps that give small doses of insulin. And with advances in construction and software, these tools have become smaller and more portable. Despite these advances, scientists are still pursuing a cure for type 1 diabetes.
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Saving money is an essential personal finance habit you want to build the right way. Having a healthy savings base achieves several things: It lessens your reliance on debt if an unexpected bill arises. And, it can help you build the discipline necessary to achieve your goals.
When used well, saving money can help you build a healthy financial foundation. However, there are also common mistakes you want to avoid.
Avoiding these mistakes ensures you’re maximizing your gains and not leaving money on the table. Here’s a look at some of the most common oopsies and ways to avoid them.
I used to have a brick-and-mortar bank, and I loved the customer service. Every time I walked in, I felt like I was on an episode of Cheers. Yet, a harsh reality hit every month when I received my statement. I was only earning pennies.
That wasn’t going to build momentum. So, I switched to a high-yield savings account with an online bank. I earn an APY that helps me reach my goals quicker.
Here’s a comparison: If I deposit $10,000 into a Chase savings account earning 0.01% APY for a year, I’m earning a dime. That’s not optimal. However, by switching to Newtek Bank, I earn an APY of 4.20% APY. Over the course of the year, I’m earning $428.92. That’s over a $400 difference in one year. And that will grow incrementally the longer I save.
Therefore, if you’re keeping your money in a low-interest account, it pays to shop around. Use this Bankrate tool to find the best high-yield savings accounts for you:
Now, the thing about these savings accounts is that they come with variable interest rates. It means they could change at any time due to Federal Reserve or bank policy. So make sure to pay close attention to rates on occasion, and if they dip, use this tool to help you find a better option.
Along with being proactive about shopping around for savings rates, there’s another critical factor you’ll need to consider.
Placing too much money in a savings account
The smart rule of thumb is to save at least six months of living expenses in an emergency fund. That way, if you experience a job loss or a surprise medical diagnosis, you can cover your bills without relying on debt.
To determine your emergency fund, add up all your essential monthly expenses, such as mortgage payments, debts, utilities, prescriptions, and household items. Once you have that total, set a savings goal to reach this amount using a high-yield savings account.
After you reach that goal, you’ll want to adjust your strategy aside from other short-term savings goals you might have. Why? Savings can help build a healthy financial foundation, but investing builds wealth. Say you have an extra $40,000 you keep in a high-yield savings account for 20 years instead of investing it and earning an average annual return of around 8%.
The difference between these strategies is significant—almost $70,000. Remember that savings protect wealth, but investing builds it. You’ll need both to achieve your long-term goals, so adjust accordingly once you reach your emergency target and short-term goals. And speaking of goals…
Not saving with a purpose
Many people save because they know it’s necessary, but there’s no direction beyond that intention. This can be problematic as aimless saving could lead to aimless spending. When you don’t have a clear objective, that money can appear as “extra” cash, making it easier to justify impulse purchases.
Meanwhile, saving with a purpose means creating “sinking funds” for an expressed purpose. By assigning every dollar a job in your savings plan, you create a mental barrier against spending it.
Think of it this way: If you’re earmarking money for a dream vacation in a year, you’re less likely to splurge on an impulse purchase because you have a bigger goal in mind. Having a target keeps you focused, so a higher reward awaits you in the future.
Which savings account is right for your goals? Here’s a guide that can help:
Goal Category
Example Goals
Recommended Account Type
Emergency Fund
Job loss, unexpected medical bills, car repairs, home maintenance
High-yield savings account (HYSA)
Short-Term Goals (0-2 years)
Vacation, new appliance purchase, holiday gifts
HYSA or a certificate of deposit
Mid-Term Goals (2-5 years)
Down payment on a house, major home renovation, or starting a small business fund
HYSA, short-term investment account (e.g., brokerage account with low-risk funds), or CD ladder (which is where you open several CDs at differing times and lengths to optimize cash flow)
Long-Term Goals (5+ years)
Retirement, child’s college education, building significant wealth
Upcoming large tax payment, insurance deductible coverage
HYSA or a money market account (MMA) that works like a savings account with debit card privileges
Develop smart habits that benefit your future
Saving money is a smart first step towards building good financial habits. Recognizing and avoiding these savings mistakes can put you on the right path to maximizing your earnings and properly allocating them to reach your short-term and long-term goals.
Many Ukrainians — even those born after the country gained independence from Moscow’s rule in 1991 — grew up with much of the same mythology of the Great Patriotic War. Ukraine, which was under German occupation for most of that war, lost some 10 million people. Mila’s surviving grandparents, like mine, celebrated every anniversary of that war’s end but almost never talked about what they had experienced. After the war, the Soviet authorities sent thousands of Ukrainians to the gulag for suspected collaboration with the Germans — in many cases, as what amounted to punishment for surviving the occupation. Ukrainians never forgot that injury. Both of those World War II stories — of the heroism of Ukrainians and of the cruelty of Moscow — inform the way Ukrainians think about the war they are fighting now.
Newer works of history reframe the period as two sides of a coin: German and Soviet occupations of Ukraine, two empires that aimed to enslave Ukrainians — Germany during World War II, the Soviet Union before and after. And yet, the number four has continued to loom large in collective memory. Now Ukraine’s patriotic war, against Russia, has crossed that threshold, with no end in sight. Russia’s offensive appeared to speed up in December. In February, Ukraine recaptured ground, in its most successful counteroffensive in more than two years. But on the whole, the front line has remained largely static for more than three years. Russia’s apparently overwhelming superiority in manpower and military resources didn’t bring about a swift victory, but neither have the resolve of the Ukrainian people and the Western aid they have received proved enough to stop Russia’s aggression.
Whatever lies ahead feels as if it will last forever. Ukrainians have organized their lives accordingly. They are living this war in their work, their social lives, their waking and sleeping hours. It is a fundamental orientation of time, values and social relations that will define many future generations of Ukrainian life.
By any measure, Ukraine is a profoundly different country now than it was four years ago. At the start of the full-scale invasion, excluding regions that were already occupied by Russia, it had a population of perhaps 36 million people, according to Tymofii Brik, a sociologist and the rector of the Kyiv School of Economics. (Other estimates tend to be higher.) Since then, Brik says, six million have been displaced inside the country and some four million — mostly women and children — have left Ukraine. More than 100,000 Ukrainians, troops and civilians, are estimated to have been killed. Millions of people live under occupation in areas Russia controls.
When people were fleeing the Russian offensive in the winter of 2022, squeezing onto overcrowded train cars headed west, few imagined that the war would go on for a long time. Either Russia’s tremendous military might or the West’s firm resolve would dictate a fast resolution, it seemed. But four years after that — and 13 months into the presidency of Donald Trump, who promised to bring the war to an end within 24 hours of his inauguration — there is no safe home for Ukrainian war refugees to return to. And there is less and less reason even to think about it: The people who stayed in Western Europe have adapted to their new homes, and to the separation from those they left behind.
“What kind of relationship can we have, with them over there and me back here?” Taras Viazovchenko said when I asked him about the state of his marriage. He got his wife and two children out of Irpin, one of the Kyiv suburbs, then under Russian occupation, on March 3, 2022. The wife and kids live in Switzerland now. He has visited once. “She’s built a life there,” he said. “The kids speak French to each other, and I don’t understand.”
Like many Ukrainians who remained in the country, Viazovchenko has lived several different lives in the past four years — lives that he has shared with his parents and some of his friends, but not with his wife and kids. Before the full-scale invasion, Viazovchenko was a yoga instructor and a member of the Irpin City Council, a position he still holds. During the weeks in 2022 when part of Irpin was occupied, he spent every day helping people escape the town. When Russian troops retreated from the Kyiv region, Viazovchenko joined the effort to identify the bodies of people killed in Irpin and neighboring Bucha, which has become synonymous with Russian war crimes.
People killed during the occupation had been buried in private yards, in group graves, in town parks, often after their bodies were left for days wherever the killing had occurred. Viazovchenko and others exhumed the bodies, interviewed loved ones and witnesses, and tried to match remains to descriptions. After several months of this work, Viazovchenko became obsessed. He and his colleagues had been able to identify more than 400 bodies, but several dozen remained. Viazovchenko couldn’t sleep. He couldn’t think of anything else. He kept unzipping the black bags in which the bodies were kept — or what remained of them after several months in morgues that didn’t consistently have electricity.
It took the intervention of visiting mental health professionals for Viazovchenko to get help. He worked on setting up therapy centers for survivors of Russian aggression in different parts of Ukraine. And then last year, at the age of 46, he enlisted. He thinks that everyone should.
To be clear, not everyone agrees. After an initial wave of volunteers immediately after the full-scale invasion, the Ukrainian armed forces have struggled to conscript enough people. People who enlisted four years ago and who are still physically able to serve have been unable to leave the service. Meanwhile, enlistment officers stage daily raids in Ukrainian cities, apprehending potential conscripts and delivering them to military bases. Some escape. At the same time, on this visit in particular, I heard many stories of people who either chose to enlist or submitted to a conscription raid and found peace in the service — and in no longer trying to evade it. Viazovchenko thinks this is as it should be, and that those who cannot serve at the front should join the war effort in the rear. He complained that, after several years of pooling money for the war effort, parents’ groups have resumed collections for gifts and flowers for teachers. That strikes him as frivolous, as does any pretense of peacetime life. As an example of proper, realistic adjustment, he cited the schools of Kharkiv, many of which have permanently moved to underground bunkers.
Underground schools have become symbols of Ukrainian unbreakability, along with warming tents set up in the shadow of unheated high rises. I visited the Kyiv School of Economics, a small, ambitious private university that has managed to draw some outstanding academic talent from both Ukraine and the West. Brik, the rector, excitedly led me to the basement, where the university has created several classrooms, complete with whiteboards. The school schedules only as many classes as can simultaneously convene in the bunker, so that whenever the air-raid alarm sounds, as it does on most days, classes can move down below. Then Brik showed me something else he was proud of: a classroom equipped for a vocational training program, this one in soldering — a skill newly in demand in the growing drone industry.
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Ms. Tereshkova is a Ukrainian photographer and filmmaker based in Berlin.
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Necessary for a presidential candidate to be able to read or even write even a congenital idiot can run for the presidency of the United States of America and serve if you were elected “
Edgar Rice Burroughs
EVIL PEOPLE
They had been long accustomed to do evil. They were taught to do evil; they had been educated and brought up in sin; they had served an apprenticeship to it, and had all their days made a trade of it. It was so much their constant practice that it had become a second nature to them. – Matthew Henry
“When a clown moves into a palace, he doesn’t become a king, the palace instead becomes a circus. — Turkish proverb,”
Hmmmmm…History is repeating itself yet again!
Isaiah 59:14
New Living Translation
14 Our courts oppose the righteous, and justice is nowhere to be found. Truth stumbles in the streets, and honesty has been outlawed.
Jeremiah 5:21
New Living Translation
21 Listen, you foolish and senseless people, with eyes that do not see and ears that do not hear.
This sounds just like today’s World although it was written about Israel in Babylonian captivity.
History repeats itself
Isaiah 59:9-15
New Living Translation
9
So there is no justice among us, and we know nothing about right living. We look for light but find only darkness. We look for bright skies but walk in gloom. 10 We grope like the blind along a wall, feeling our way like people without eyes. Even at brightest noontime, we stumble as though it were dark. Among the living, we are like the dead. 11 We growl like hungry bears; we moan like mournful doves. We look for justice, but it never comes. We look for rescue, but it is far away from us. 12 For our sins are piled up before God and testify against us. Yes, we know what sinners we are. 13 We know we have rebelled and have denied the Lord. We have turned our backs on our God. We know how unfair and oppressive we have been, carefully planning our deceitful lies. 14 Our courts oppose the righteous, and justice is nowhere to be found. Truth stumbles in the streets, and honesty has been outlawed. 15 Yes, truth is gone, and anyone who renounces evil is attacked.
The Lord looked and was displeased to find there was no justice.
Below the surface, Greenland’s ice appears to be churning up, a process one scientist described as akin to a “boiling pot of pasta”
Hidden underneath the surface of Greenland’s ice, there are strange, vast structures known as “plumes.” But for years, scientists didn’t know how these curious forms came to be—until now. A new study published in the journal Cryosphere reveals that the structures may have been caused by thermal convection in a process similar to the churning of the hot rock in Earth’s mantle.
Convection is caused by temperature differences within a material. Hot material rises, and cool material falls—driving a cycling, or convection. The same phenomenon appears to occur in ice, too, indicating that parts of the ice sheet may be softer than scientists realized. That’s important for one crucial reason: we know that Greenland’s ice sheet is rapidly melting. And as the climate warms, scientists are racing to understand how exactly it will melt and how fast.
“We typically think of ice as a solid material, so the discovery that parts of the Greenland ice sheet actually undergo thermal convection, resembling a boiling pot of pasta, is as wild as it is fascinating,” said Andreas Born, a professor of Earth science at the University of Bergen in Norway, in a statement.
Although the findings do not necessarily mean that the ice sheet will melt faster, they could offer clues as to how it may melt. And that knowledge is critical—the sheet is more than 650,000 square miles in size; by one estimate, if all of it melts, it will raise the planet’s sea levels by a whopping 24 feet.
“Our discovery could be key to reducing uncertainties in models of future ice sheet mass balance and sea-level rise,” Born said in the same statement.
Nemesio “El Mencho” Oseguera Cervantes, the powerful and long-pursued head of the Jalisco New Generation Cartel and one of the world’s most-wanted traffickers, died following a Mexican military operation on Sunday, handing the country a consequential victory as it looks to show tangible results to the Trump administration.
Oseguera, a former police officer, led the Jalisco New Generation Cartel, or CJNG, as it became one of the “most powerful and ruthless criminal organizations” inside Mexico, according to the US Drug Enforcement Administration.
Violence erupted in several states in Mexico after security forces from multiple federal branches of Mexico’s military carried out the operation in the town of Tapalpa in the western state of Jalisco. Officials said suspected members of organized crime unleashed a wave of violence following the operation, torching buses and businesses while clashing with security forces.
The US State Department urged American nationals in parts of Mexico to “seek shelter and remain in residences or hotels” until further notice.
Mexico’s Secretariat of National Defense said that US authorities provided “complementary information” that supported the operation. A US defense official confirmed that an interagency US task force “played a role” in the operation. However, the precise role that the US played is still unclear.
Since its establishment in January, the Joint Interagency Task Force-Counter Cartel has regularly worked with the Mexican military through US Northern Command to combat cartel operations along the US-Mexico border, the US official said.
“However, I want to emphasize that this was a (Mexican military) operation, so the success is theirs,” the official noted.
During the raid, CJNG members traded fire with the government forces, resulting in four gang members being killed at the scene, the defense ministry said.
Osegeura and two others were seriously injured and died as they were being transported via aircraft to Mexico City, according to the ministry.
Three Mexican military personnel were also injured in the operation and transferred to a hospital in Mexico City for treatment.
Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum lauded the work of the agencies involved in the mission.
Mexico’s various state governments are working in “full coordination” to address the disorder, Sheinbaum said on Sunday, adding that “activities are proceeding normally” in most of the country.
“We work every day for the peace, security, justice, and well-being of Mexico,” she said.
Flights canceled as chaos erupts across Mexico
The military operation triggered a series of violent events across the state of Jalisco, which is scheduled to host four matches of the 2026 soccer World Cup in June, before spreading to other states such as Michoacán and Guanajuato.
Suspected members of organized crime groups set buses on fire, blocked roads in the area, and clashed with authorities, Jalisco Governor Pablo Lemus Navarro reported.
Video obtained by CNN showed multiple fires burning and plumes of smoke rising across Puerto Vallarta, a resort town popular with US tourists on Mexico’s west coast.
Violence erupted in several states in Mexico after security forces from multiple federal branches of Mexico’s military carried out the operation in the town of Tapalpa in the western state of Jalisco. Officials said suspected members of organized crime unleashed a wave of violence following the operation, torching buses and businesses while clashing with security forces.
The US State Department urged American nationals in parts of Mexico to “seek shelter and remain in residences or hotels” until further notice.
Mexico’s Secretariat of National Defense said that US authorities provided “complementary information” that supported the operation. A US defense official confirmed that an interagency US task force “played a role” in the operation. However, the precise role that the US played is still unclear.
Since its establishment in January, the Joint Interagency Task Force-Counter Cartel has regularly worked with the Mexican military through US Northern Command to combat cartel operations along the US-Mexico border, the US official said.
“However, I want to emphasize that this was a (Mexican military) operation, so the success is theirs,” the official noted.
During the raid, CJNG members traded fire with the government forces, resulting in four gang members being killed at the scene, the defense ministry said.
Osegeura and two others were seriously injured and died as they were being transported via aircraft to Mexico City, according to the ministry.
Three Mexican military personnel were also injured in the operation and transferred to a hospital in Mexico City for treatment.
Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum lauded the work of the agencies involved in the mission.
Mexico’s various state governments are working in “full coordination” to address the disorder, Sheinbaum said on Sunday, adding that “activities are proceeding normally” in most of the country.
“We work every day for the peace, security, justice, and well-being of Mexico,” she said.
As a result of the violence, several airlines, including Delta Air Lines, Alaska Airlines, American Airlines and Air Canada, cancelled flights to Puerto Vallarta and Guadalajara, leaving some tourists temporarily stranded.
Footage captured at major airports and verified by CNN showed distant smoke and panicked travelers.
At Guadalajara’s international airport, travelers took cover near a jetway and sprinted through the terminal.
Another video showed a large group of people being escorted by uniformed employees across the tarmac of Puerto Vallarta’s main airport.
Amid the flight cancellations, Mexico’s Federal Civil Aviation Agency reported that the airports of Guadalajara, Puerto Vallarta and Tepic had resumed normal operations on Sunday afternoon.
During the military operation, Lemus urged residents to remain in their homes and said that public transportation services in Jalisco would be suspended “until the situation is under control.”
The governor stated that the violence has spread to at least five states and urged the public to avoid traveling on highways.
The Michoacán Public Security Secretariat reported that efforts are underway to restore traffic flow following the road blockades.
Meanwhile, the Guanajuato Security and Peace Secretariat reported fires at pharmacies and convenience stores in different parts of the state.
“No injuries have been reported, but there has been property damage,” the statement added, announcing the deployment of a security operation in coordination with the Army, the National Guard, and municipal police.
Carlos Navarro, 54, a US-Mexico dual citizen, was traveling to visit family in a small town in his home state of Jalisco as the operation unfolded.
While waiting for a connecting bus in Guadalajara, he was informed that the service was canceled due to a bus being set on fire.
Navarro took refuge in a nearby Walmart, where panicked employees permitted him to stay even as an evacuation was underway.
“You hear about it, but it’s very different to hear it on the news than to experience it firsthand,” he told CNN, “It’s very difficult because it makes you very sad. It makes you very sad because I love my country.”
Most-wanted person in Mexico
Oseguera worked for CJNG as it splintered off from the Milenio Cartel, eventually rising through the ranks to lead the criminal enterprise.
Under his leadership, CJNG expanded its power and control in Jalisco and the surrounding area.
Mexican authorities long sought to apprehend Oseguera for his involvement in the cartel. In 2018, Mexico’s Attorney General’s Office offered 30 million pesos ($1.7 million USD) for information leading to his arrest.
Oseguera was also wanted by US authorities, who offered a bounty of up to $15 million for information leading to his arrest.
The US Justice Department charged Oseguera in 2022 with leading the effort to manufacture and distribute fentanyl for importation into the US.
A Justice Department indictment of Oseguera said his organization is active in the Mexican states of Jalisco, Colima, and Veracruz, and has a presence elsewhere.
In 2025, Oseguera was sanctioned and classified as a Specially Designated Global Terrorist by the US Department of State.
In a post on X, Deputy Secretary of State Christopher Landau described Oseguera’s death as a “great development for Mexico, the US, Latin America, and the world.”
He added that he is watching the chaotic scenes in Mexico “with great sadness and concern.”
Pressure from Trump
Sheinbaum has previously cast doubt on the strategy of targeting cartel kingpins, warning that decapitating criminal organizations can fracture them into rival factions and ignite new cycles of violence. Yet security remains a persistent vulnerability for her administration.
Over the past year, Sheinbaum has come under intensifying pressure from US President Donald Trump, as he threatens military intervention and higher import tariffs if Mexico fails to demonstrate concrete gains in curbing drug trafficking.
Shortly after the US capture of ousted Venezuelan leader Nicolás Maduro, Trump suggested that he could expand his military campaign to Mexican drug trafficking groups.
Sheinbaum has rejected the notion of US strikes in Mexico, characterizing them as a violation of Mexico’s sovereignty and territorial integrity.
Instead, she has pursued a direct approach to combating organized crime by increasing cooperation with US security partners.
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Ms. Tereshkova is a Ukrainian photographer and filmmaker based in Berlin.
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