Enrique Peña Nieto accused of taking bribes for Pegasus

MEXICO CITY.— In order to open the doors of Enrique Peña Nieto 's government and sell him security equipment, including the Pegasus spyware , Israeli businessmen Uri Emmanuel Ansbacher and Avishay Samuel Neriya gave the president $25 million, likely for his 2012 political campaign. This amount was at the center of a conciliation agreement the two signed at the end of 2024 to settle a dispute, according to Proceso.

The alleged bribe, revealed by Israeli outlet The Marker , was contained in an agreement the two businessmen signed to divide up Mexico’s security agencies . The document referred to the $25 million as “a joint investment (by Ansbacher and Neriya) in a high-ranking figure” in Mexico, identified as “N”; parts of the agreement referred to “N’s mandate” or “N-elect,” on dates and in circumstances that leave little doubt that “N” was Enrique Peña Nieto.

The Marker report cites a " source familiar with the two men's business dealings" who asserted that "a large portion of the funds mentioned in the lawsuit were used to finance political expenses, likely in the 2012 campaign that elected Peña Nieto as president."

During Peña Nieto's six-year term, at least three agencies had contracted Pegasus — the Ministry of National Defense , the then Attorney General's Office (PGR), and the Center for National Security Research (Cisen)—and used it massively to tap the phones of their targets, including thousands of journalists, human rights defenders, and political opponents.

Although Ansbacher and Neriya were partners in BSD Security Systems , which sold spy systems to Mexican security agencies, both had personal business dealings with institutions in the country. According to the settlement agreement, reviewed by The Marker, the businessmen "divided" the Mexican clients: some agencies "belonged" to Ansbacher and others to Neriya.

In addition to selling Pegasus, the two businessmen were involved in major deals involving the country's prisons—including a 1.631 billion peso contract with the Decentralized Administrative Body for Prevention and Social Readaptation (OADPRS) —in the sale of technologies from the drone company Aeronautics and in the sale of military equipment, as well as in a water-related project.

Some of the business continued during Andrés Manuel López Obrador's six-year term . The Ministry of Defense, Pegasus 's largest client in the world, continued to enter into contracts with Ansbacher companies during the Tabasco native's six-year term, although the institution always refused to disclose them, despite an order from the now-defunct National Institute for Transparency, Access to Information, and Protection of Personal Data (INAI).

The military also continued to use Pegasus, among others, to attack journalists and human rights defenders, as revealed by Proceso and the other media outlets that participated in the Army Spy investigation. Among the victims of military espionage are journalist Ricardo Raphael, Tamaulipas human rights defender Raymundo Ramos , and lawyers from the Agustín Pro Juárez Human Rights Center, but also Alejandro Encinas Rodríguez —then undersecretary of human rights at the Ministry of the Interior (Segob)—and several senior officials on his team.

Ansbacher's network of companies also had shady contracts with the National Migration Institute (INM), which paid him 324 million pesos in 2020, of which 230 million pesos ended up in 26 shell companies, according to the Superior Audit Office of the Federation (ASF) . One of the companies hired by the INM, called Nemecisco, sent $248,000 to an Israeli nonprofit run by Neryia's brother, to which other Ansbacher companies "donated" resources.

And not only that: according to The Marker, Ansbacher is reportedly trying to “pave his way back (to Mexico) under the government of the relatively new president Claudia Sheinbaum ,” without specifying whether the controversial intermediary, who is at the center of an investigation by the Attorney General's Office (FGR) , has had contracts with the new administration.

As part of the international investigation Cartel Project , coordinated by Forbidden Stories and published in December 2020, Proceso revealed that Tomás Zerón de Lucio, who was head of the Criminal Investigation Agency ( AIC ) during Peña Nieto's six-year term, had managed to flee Mexico and hide in Israel during the pandemic thanks to his ties to businessmen in that country, including Neriya.

According to The Marker, this ultra-Orthodox Jewish businessman from a wealthy family had direct access to Enrique Peña Nieto. In 2014, his government appointed him honorary consul of Mexico in the Israeli city of Haifa. During Peña Nieto's six-year term, Zerón was one of the key players in the acquisition of spy technologies.

Ansbacher, for his part, is a friend of Shalev Hulio , the founder of the NSO Group, which developed the Pegasus spyware. During the Peña Nieto and López Obrador administrations, Ansbacher represented NSO Group in Mexico; the businessman has been investigated by the Attorney General's Office in connection with the espionage against journalist Carmen Aristegui.

According to The Marker, Ansbacher and Neriya arrived in Mexico in the early 2000s.

They arrived as emissaries of the Torah Mitzion organization, which seeks to strengthen ties between Jewish communities and Israel.

"By accident," they became intermediaries in the security business, starting with "simple military equipment." "A Jew needed to sell military vests to Mexico and asked them if they knew how to get them; they said yes, and from there things took off," the report stated.

The Israeli media report indicated that the dispute between Ansbacher and Neriya erupted when the former sued the latter for failing to fulfill a promise to meet with Peña Nieto three times, meetings for which Neriya charged him nearly $5 million. The dispute then went to arbitration, where some details of his lucrative business dealings in Mexico came to light.