It's February 19th. I'm Brian Dean Wright, former CIA operations officer, and this is The Wright Report.

A good day to you, ladies and gentlemen, welcome to The Right Report, Your Daily News, podcast.

I've got a headline brief for you this morning, heavier on news, lighter on analysis that, as ever, is still going to shape America and the world.

We begin with an update from Mexico. The CIA is confirmed to be flying drones above the skies of Mexico this morning.

CNN and my own sources confirmed that the agency has been flying these drones for a couple weeks now.

They are equipped with advanced optics that are locating, monitoring, and building what is called

pattern of life data on the various cartel members and their drug labs for either future missile strikes or targeted ground assassinations.

Now, while the drone flights aren't new in some senses, the U.S. has collected drone intel over Mexican territory before,

this effort by the White House is both expanded, and it is not exactly fully briefed to the Mexican President Claudia Scheinbaum., of course, is due to likely penetrations of her government by cartel members.

Reuters news is reporting to Ms. Scheinbaum was asked about this drone new operation, and she downplayed it by calling it, quote, part of a little campaign, end quote.

This news comes weeks after the U.S. Air Force and Navy have

confirmed that they have been operating surveillance, intel, and reconnaissance flights as well,

all to the west of Mexico, out in the Pacific Ocean, and the Gulf of California. It also comes

after my reports yesterday that the Trump CIA is expanding their counter-narcotics mission to focus on the

cartels in a way that we have not seen since the Reagan era back in the 1980s.

One other final note on this CIA update, the New York Times is reporting that the drones

have become quite good at spotting cartel drug labs due to the release of certain chemical vapors into the

air. Also, the Times is reporting that the Trump administration has ordered a new targeting

team to be close to the border to assemble some targeting packages for future strikes. Also of

interest, the Times confirms that some of this drone program was actually operational during the Biden era.

And the Times, however, did not clarify exactly why the Biden team did not authorize those kinetic

or lethal strikes on cartel targets. Apparently, there were none. However, the Times did say

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