Day-to-Day Murders in Mexico Drop Thirty-Seven Percent Under Claudia Sheinbaum, As per Government Data

The typical figure of daily murders each month in Mexico has dropped by 37% since Head of State Claudia Sheinbaum assumed power, per new administrative data. However, public safety specialists have cautioned that murder numbers could fail to signal better national safety.

Notable Reduction in Daily Averages

There was an mean of close to 55 killings a day in last November versus almost 87 when Sheinbaum began the presidential office in September. This data was provided by the head of the nation's national public security agency, Marcela Figueroa Franco, during the leader's daily press briefing on a recent Tuesday.

“The figures in homicides that we’ve had over these months is very important,” Claudia Sheinbaum said, adding that the previous month the smallest number of murders were recorded for any November in the past decade.

Recent Background and Government Strategy

Violent drug cartel internal conflicts, coupled with the government’s heavily military efforts to combat the drug gangs, have led to Mexico’s homicide numbers soar in recent times. The figure hit a record high of 36,773 killings in 2020, as reported by the country’s official data office.

That meant Mexico a murder rate more than 4x higher than that of the United States. From that point, homicides have been on the decline, falling to 33,550 last year. Claudia Sheinbaum has linked her public safety plan for an apparently more pronounced reduction in killings in the current year.

At a news briefing in August, the head of state stated: “We have a strategy, there is monitoring of the strategy, and we have specific tracking town by town in certain cases. The approach is effective. And we have to keep working at it every day.”

The central components of the President's security strategy involve:

• Reinforcing Mexico’s national guard.
• Advancing intelligence and investigation work.
• Increased collaboration between various agencies.

Analyst Skepticism and Data Limitations

However, security analysts cautioned that relying on homicide data to paint a picture of peace was flawed. This is especially true in light of the rise in other crimes such as people going missing.

“This would be very good news if this was a drop, but I think we shouldn't just focus on the murder numbers and say: ‘Alright, good,’” commented Cecilia Farfán-Méndez, an expert on Mexico's organised crime. “I would be tentatively hopeful.”

As reported by the public policy research organization Mexico Evalúa, killings in total declined by over 20% in the first 10 months of this year relative to the identical timeframe last year. However, disappearances have increased by 15% and in certain states have surged by up to 200%.

“Statistics on murders is not reliable for estimating the context of violence,” argued Armando Vargas, a safety analyst at Mexico Evalúa. “Firstly, we have police and investigators who lack the capacity or the inclination to correctly recognize and categorize remains. Second, organised [criminals] … have the capability to hide violent acts through abductions.”

Vargas noted that using monthly means of daily homicides was also problematic because it may hide days when there were notably spiking levels of killings.

“Using the daily mean makes surges of violence unseen,” he stated.

Arrests and Confiscations as Measures of Success

An area where the administration can cite the success of its security strategy is on arrests and confiscations. Nearly 40,000 individuals were arrested between last October and this past November for serious crimes, according to government data. More than 20,000 guns were confiscated and 311 tons of narcotics intercepted.

“Donald Trump can't accuse President Sheinbaum of inaction, because actually she is accomplishing a lot with these many thousands of detentions, many thousands of confiscations, and all the tactical weakening of organised crime. It’s highly in political terms beneficial,” said Vargas.

Persistent Unrest and Societal Frustration

Yet notwithstanding these measures, Mexico remains grappling with severe violence, with a number of regions in the midst of cartel-related conflict. Last month there was a high-profile assassination of a popular mayor in the state of Michoacan, one of 10 mayors murdered in the last year.

A short time later, many thousands of protesters took to the streets in Mexico City and across the country to express their frustration at graft and narco-violence.

“The federal government frames [data] in a way to build a narrative of improvement. Politically it’s highly potent, socially it’s highly debatable,” Vargas concluded.