Feds warn against spring break travel to Mexico

As many high school and college students around the country plan their annual spring break vacations, the U.S. State Department warns against travel to Mexico.

Popular resort destinations like Acapulco, Cabo San Lucas, Guadalajara, La Paz, Mazatlan, Puerto Vallarta, and even Tijuana are among the locations the feds caution travel to because of violence attributed to the "activities of criminal organizations."

As Breitbart Texas reported, the tourist hotspot of Acapulco, Guerrero, has become the scene of of a fierce turf war as rival drug cartels continue to fight for control of the region. In December, the State Department named Guerrero "the most violent state in Mexico in 2015 for a third year in a row, and self-defense groups operate independently of the government in many areas," noting that armed members of these groups in Guerrero maintain roadblocks which "although not considered hostile to foreigners or tourists, are suspicious of outsiders and should be considered volatile and unpredictable."

Officials also urge spring break travelers to exercise caution in Baja California Sur getaways like Cabo San Lucas and La Paz because of homicides, many of which happened in La Paz "where there have been ongoing public acts of violence between rival criminal organizations."

Guadalajara and Puerto Vallarta in Jalisco are subject to travel restrictions related to "continued instability" in the bordering states of Michoacán and Zacatecas. Baja California, home to Tijuana, Rosarito, Ensenada, Tecate, and Mexicali, experienced increased homicide rates last year because of "targeted criminal organization assassinations" and "turf battles between criminal groups."

This "spring break" alert stems from the State Department's December 2016 Mexico Travel Warning. It classified Mexico as a country with a high potential for kidnapping, carjacking, homicide, robbery, and other crimes because of a lack of security measures in place for travelers. Fourteen of Mexico's 31 states were flagged as dangerous after Americans became victims of these and other violent crimes.