U.S. designates Ecuador’s Chone Killers as terrorist group

Washington hit Ecuador’s Chone Killers with dual terrorism labels on July 1, opening the way for sanctions, blocked assets and criminal exposure for anyone in the United States who knowingly helps the gang. Secretary of State Marco Rubio said the Ecuadorian group had carried out numerous attacks on civilians, law enforcement officers and government officials, including high-profile assassinations of public officials.

The State Department designated Chone Killers both a Foreign Terrorist Organization and a Specially Designated Global Terrorist, a combination that matters because it activates two separate legal tracks. An FTO designation under section 219 of the Immigration and Nationality Act makes it a crime to knowingly provide material support or resources to the group, while Executive Order 13224 authorizes the U.S. government to block the assets of foreign individuals and entities that commit or support terrorism and to prohibit U.S. persons from dealing in blocked property. The Treasury Department’s sanctions lists are the enforcement channel.

The designation also reaches into Ecuador’s security relationship with Washington. The State Department said Chone Killers began as a faction of Los Choneros before breaking away in 2020, and Los Choneros had already been designated as both an FTO and an SDGT. Ecuador’s foreign ministry welcomed the move, and the Noboa government praised U.S. backing for its campaign to dismantle gang-crime networks, signaling that the terrorism label is now part of a wider cross-border security strategy rather than a symbolic rebuke.

The move fits the Trump administration’s broader crackdown on criminal gangs and narcoterrorists across Latin America. That approach gives Washington more room to pressure financiers, intermediaries and shell entities tied to violent groups, but it has also drawn criticism from legal analysts who warn that terrorism designations can blur the line between organized crime and insurgent threats. Those critics say the framework can broaden the legal and political basis for harsher coercive measures, while pulling gangs into a national-security model built for armed extremist groups.