legislation is targeting the Arellano Feliz, Beltran Leyva, La Familia Michoacana, Los Zetas and Sinaloa and Gulf cartels — the most violent and successful cartels in Mexico.

Drug cartels may find themselves in even more trouble than normal if new legislation in Congress passes.

Rep. Michael McCaul, R-Austin, introduced a bill Wednesday that, if passed, will designate six top Mexican cartels as “foreign terrorist organizations.”

If the cartels are indeed labeled terrorist organizations, the US State Department would be able to charge drug and gun traffickers with supporting terrorism. According to McCaul spokesman Mike Rosen, this is the first time any member of Congress has tried to designate what the cartels are doing as acts of terrorism.

The legislation is targeting the Arellano Feliz, Beltran Leyva, La Familia Michoacana, Los Zetas and Sinaloa and Gulf cartels — the most violent and successful cartels in Mexico. The war on drugs has already claimed nearly 35,000 lives since 2006.

The proposal is more than just a new title — the distinction would allow prosecutors to tack on 15 years to any conviction of providing aid or supplies to cartels. It would also level a federal death sentence against any cartel action that results in death.

McCaul recognizes that cartel actions are not religiously motivated, but said in the Chronicle that the organizations are routinely found “using similar tactics to gain political and economic influence,” as well as utilizing “kidnappings, political assassinations, attacks on civilian and military targets, taking over cities and even putting up checkpoints in order to control territory and institutions.”

Frankly, any label that can be used to stop the cartel’s criminal operations is fine. Label them terrorists, mafiosos, drug traffickers — the end result is the same.

To put the cartel’s 35,000 death count into perspective, that’s more than 7 times the casualties the US has sustained in the Iraq war — and the cartels have racked it up in half the amount of time America has spent overseas.

McCaul seems to have the right idea. If a label is what’s needed to crack down on the violence south of the border, then a label is what Congress should provide.