Misinformation About Mexico’s Historic Election Is Spreading. Here’s What to Know.
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Claudia Sheinbaum, who won a historic election to become Mexico’s first woman president, secured the presidency by promising continuity as part of the Morena (National Regeneration Movement) party.
The former Mexico City mayor and leftist was bolstered by the backing of her predecessor, mentor, and current Mexican president, Andrés Manuel López Obrador. Despite his endorsement, ABC News reports that Sheinbaum is a different personality from Obrador, leaving Mexicans to wait and see how she proceeds in her new post.
Still, despite the buzz surrounding her historic win, many American media outlets and individuals’ viral posts across social media continue to spread misinformation regarding the political positions of her party, Sheinbaum’s mayorship track record, and the election in general. For instance, many cite Sheinbaum’s career as a climate scientist as a net positive for the country, but, as journalist Caroline Tracey wrote on X, her party has pushed a “uniquely destructive environmental policy.” “Claudia’s experience as a scientist is something to which she should be held accountable, not something she has represented thus far,” she continued.
Here, Teen Vogue breaks down some of the biggest areas of misinformation regarding Mexico’s newest president.
What does Sheinbaum’s win mean for Mexican democracy?
Sheinbaum’s predecessor’s presidential tenure marked the most violent in Mexico's history. According to Reuters, “murders still hover around 30,000 a year and more people have been killed during his presidency than during any other administration in Mexico’s modern history.” In the six years of Obrador’s presidency, this brings the total estimated number of murders to nearly 200,000. The violence extends to government leaders at the state level: from September 2023 to May 2024, across Mexico, 34 candidates or aspiring candidates were assassinated. While voting appeared peaceful at most of Mexico’s approximately 170,000 polling places, there were incidents of violence and ballot box burning reported.
Sheinbaum’s win, many have noted, could be “very stark” for Mexican democracy. Deteriorating state-level power, in which the Obrador administration has centralized power in the presidency, suggests a democracy at risk – and leaves the nation vulnerable to more power struggles with organized crime across the country.
In an op-ed written before the election, when the selection seemed down to two final candidates, Arizona Republic reporter Elvia Díaz wrote, “It’s worrisome to think that neither Sheinbaum nor Gálvez can or are willing to take on the cartels and U.S. aggression.”
The ruling party failed to secure a two-thirds supermajority in both houses of Congress, which would have allowed the coalition to pass constitutional reforms without opposition support. Still, the narrow miss means that only a few politicians stand in the way of supermajority votes — a notable outcome in a country that saw one-party rule for 70 years until 2000.
Per NPR, there's lingering concern about López Obrador’s moves to undermine judicial independence and the independent electoral body (INE). Some worry that this centralization, and the security policy that has resulted in record high homicides, will only continue under Sheinbaum’s rule.
Is Sheinbaum’s win a feminist win?
Sheinbaum’s election has been lauded as an historic win, representing the first woman leader of a nation in North America. Still, Mexico is a country with one of the highest rates of femicide in the world, and activists and scholars are cautious that her win could be largely symbolic, after a campaign short on promises to tackle high rates of domestic violence and unequal abortion access.
"Being a woman does not necessarily embody progressiveness in the women's rights' agenda," Friné Salguero, director at the Simone de Beauvoir Leadership Institute, a feminist civil society group based in Mexico City, told Context News. Regarding femicide, Sheinbaum’s stance continues López Obrador's plan to shift power to the military, giving them control of big infrastructure projects and a larger role in public security – a concern for researchers of gender based violence. Maïssa Hubert, subdirector at gender justice center EQUIS told Context News that hundreds of thousands of women have named soldiers as perpetrators of violence.
And, some have pointed to Sheinbaum’s 2019 promise to eradicate violence against women as mayor of Mexico City. Instead, “the femicide epidemic in the Mexican capital — and the rest of the country — continued to rage,” columnist Belén Fernández wrote. As of 2022, an average of 10 women or girls were killed in Mexico daily.
As Mexico City mayor, Sheinbaum also had a “tense” relationship with feminist groups, according to reports. Activists noted excessive use of force against women during demonstrations during her mayorship. In a country where patriarchal ideals still run rampant, particularly in rural areas, the president-elect faces a staggering amount of gender equality issues.
Where does Sheinbaum stand on Palestine and Israel?
Beyond being the first woman president of Mexico, Sheinbaum is also the first Jewish president of the nation, which is overwhelmingly Catholic in population. Sheinbaum penned an op-ed for Mexican newspaper La Jornada in 2009, calling for Palestinian liberation and reflecting on her own family’s history of escaping persecution. “Because of my Jewish origin, because of my love for Mexico and because I feel like a citizen of the world, I share with millions the desire for justice, equality, fraternity and peace,” Sheinbaum explained in the op-ed. “No reason justifies the murder of Palestinian civilians.”
This has led many online to laud Sheinbaum’s support of Palestine, but it may not translate to policy. Sheinbaum is López Obrador’s political protégée and has followed his political positioning with unwavering loyalty – a presidency which has refused to cut ties with Israel in any meaningful way. University students at the Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México in Mexico City, who launched a solidarity encampment on their campus in May and relocated to the city’s central plaza, the Zócalo, in front of the national palace, demand both university divestment in Israel as well as severance of diplomatic ties with Israel at the national level.
Carla Torres, an organizer of the encampment, told Al-Jazeera that Mexico's relationship with its northern neighbor is the primary reason the president has not denounced Israel more forcefully, citing its dependence on its largest trading partner and a staunch ally to Israel. The U.S. provides $3.8 billion in unconditional military aid to Israel every year.
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