Daily Homicides in Mexico Decline 37% During President Sheinbaum, As per Government Statistics

The mean count of per-day murders monthly in the country has dropped by thirty-seven percent since President Claudia Sheinbaum began her term, per recent administrative statistics. Nevertheless, public safety specialists have cautioned that murder numbers could fail to indicate improved national security.

Marked Decline in Per-Day Figures

There was an mean of close to 55 murders a day in last November versus nearly 87 when Sheinbaum began the presidential office in September of last year. This information was shared by the head of the nation's national safety agency, Marcela Figueroa Franco, during the president’s daily press briefing on a recent Tuesday.

“The outcome in homicides that we have seen during these months is remarkably notable,” the President stated, noting that in November the lowest amount of homicides were documented for any single November in the last 10 years.

Historical Background and Official Strategy

Intense drug cartel infighting, alongside the government’s heavily militarised efforts to confront the cartels, have caused Mexico’s murder numbers soar in recent years. The rate peaked at a peak of 36,773 homicides in 2020, as reported by the country’s national statistics agency.

That resulted in Mexico a homicide figure more than four times higher than the United States. From that point, murders have been on the decrease, declining to 33,550 last year. The President has linked her public safety strategy for an seemingly sharper reduction in homicides in the current year.

At a press conference in August, the President declared: “There is a plan, we have monitoring of the plan, and there is detailed monitoring town by town in certain cases. The approach works. And we have to persist at it every day.”

The key pillars of Sheinbaum’s safety plan encompass:

• Bolstering Mexico’s national guard.
• Enhancing information gathering and investigation efforts.
• Increased coordination between various agencies.

Expert Caution and Data Limitations

However, security analysts cautioned that relying on homicide numbers to paint a picture of improved security was flawed. This is especially true considering the uptick in other criminal activities such as forced disappearances.

“This would be very good information if this was a drop, but I think we must not just focus on the homicide data and think: ‘Well then, excellent,’” commented Cecilia Farfán-Méndez, an authority on Mexican criminal organizations. “I would be cautiously optimistic.”

As reported by the public policy research thinktank Mexico Evalúa, murders overall dropped by more than 20% in the initial 10 months of this year compared with the identical period the previous year. However, missing persons cases have gone up by 15% and in certain states have risen by up to 200%.

“Data on murders is not valid for estimating the situation of insecurity,” argued Armando Vargas, a safety analyst at Mexico Evalúa. “Firstly, we have police and prosecutors who do not have the resources or the desire to accurately recognize and classify bodies. Secondly, organised [criminals] … have the means to conceal violence through abductions.”

Vargas noted that using monthly averages of daily homicides was additionally problematic because it may hide periods when there were especially high numbers of murders.

“Using the per-day average renders high peaks of violent crime invisible,” he said.

Arrests and Seizures as Metrics of Success

An area where the administration can point to the effectiveness of its safety plan is on arrests and seizures. Close to 40,000 people were apprehended between October 2024 and this past November for serious crimes, per official data. Over 20,000 guns were taken and 311 tons of drugs intercepted.

“Donald Trump can't claim President Sheinbaum of not acting, because actually she is accomplishing a lot with these many thousands of detentions, many thousands of confiscations, and all the operational weakening of organised crime. It’s very politically profitable,” said Vargas.

Persistent Violence and Societal Anger

But in spite of these measures, Mexico continues to be beset by severe violence, with multiple regions in the midst of cartel-fueled conflict. Recently there was a prominent assassination of a well-liked local official in the region of Michoacan, one of 10 local leaders assassinated in the past 12 months.

A short time later, many thousands of youth demonstrated in Mexico City and throughout the country to express their frustration at corruption and narco-violence.

“The government frames [data] in a manner to create a picture of safety. From a political standpoint it’s extremely potent, socially it’s highly questionable,” Vargas concluded.