Citizen journalists in Nuevo Laredo recorded the moment when a team of cartel gunmen appear to patrol the streets in a truck with Texas plates featuring a mounted machine gun.

The video was shared by the citizen journalists operating the Twitter account of La Voz Del Pueblo or @LPueblo2, who document local violence since news outlets are muffled by the Cartel Del Noreste faction (CDN) of Los Zetas.

In the video, the citizen journalist pulls up behind a red truck with a mounted machine gun. Two cartel men wearing cloned military body armor and tactical helmets appear in the back of the bed. The video suggests the CDN has enough operational control to openly patrol the region with heavy firepower, much like the Mexican military and law enforcement in other cities.

Citizen journalists have been targeted in the past by the CDN, leading to some beaten and humiliated in public. Cartel gunmen have also undressed and spray- painted them.

In several border cities, some local residents chose to become citizen journalists to fill the void left by muffled news outlets. The CDN has enough control over media in Nuevo Laredo that they praise the cartel for toy giveaways. Outlets and some human rights groups have been co-opted to lay blame on the military and police for cartel violence. As Breitbart News reported, the tactic proved successful in duping the United Nations to condemn military forces over executions carried out by gunmen. In the Texas border city of Laredo, local news outlets do not routinely cover the raging cartel war to the south, nor the daily horrors of Los Zetas.

Ildefonso Ortiz is an award-winning journalist with Breitbart Border / Cartel Chronicles. He co-founded the Cartel Chronicles project with Brandon Darby and senior Breitbart management. You can follow him on Twitter and on Facebook. He can be contacted at Iortiz@breitbart.com.

Brandon Darby is the managing director and editor-in-chief of Breitbart Border / Cartel Chronicles. He co-founded the Cartel Chronicles project with Ildefonso Ortiz and senior Breitbart management. Follow him on Twitter and Facebook. He can be contacted at bdarby@breitbart.com.