Sheinbaum: A mid-year report card
The good, the bad, and the ugly as the Mexican government settles in.
As a lucky few head off to enjoy their summer holidays, it is a good time to take stock of how Mexico’s newish government has done since Claudia Sheinbaum came into office in October of last year.
It was a smooth transition insofar as Sheinbaum was her predecessor’s handpicked successor. A good chunk of her team and most of her political allies were inherited from that previous administration.
The fear that she’d be a carbon copy of Andrés Manuel López Obrador, president from 2018 to 2024, has been unfounded. In fact, in everything that has been in her executive hands, she has deviated significantly, particularly in economic and security policy.
Now, to steer the ship of State significantly in nine months means that the president needs to have hit the rudder pretty hard. This decisiveness has both helped her and also created some of the biggest issues in her government. This is the good and the bad.
The ugly is a different matter altogether. This category highlights the aspects of power where Sheinbaum has proved relatively powerless, saddled either by previous policy or with past allies-turned-political burdens.
Will the good, the bad, or the ugly come out on top in the following months and years of her administration? Take a look at a breakdown of each and decide.
But first, if you are not yet a paying subscriber, do consider becoming one.
Throughout the following breakdown you’ll see a series of reports and analyses by The Mexico Political Economist all of which rely on our loyal paying subscribers. In this unstable age for media, we’re lucky to be a fully subscriber-funded publication. It means we can keep writing quality and in-depth journalism about Mexico in English while being held accountable only to you, our readers.
The good: Sheinbaum steadies the economic wheel
Mexico’s economy is stagnant, predicted to grow by about 0.1% this year. Job creation is falling, hinting that economic tough times are round the corner. People, generally though, are feeling happy
In recent years, the Mexican government has consistently outdone doomsayers on the basis of one key counterargument: It doesn’t matter how much the economy grows if it all ends up in a few billionaires’ pockets.
Moreover, a policy of redistribution has kept growth steady while keeping both companies and people happy. This is because the basis of growth has been domestic consumption. That is what has kept the instability of Trump 2.0 at bay—which has caused exports to fall and made layoffs in the industrial sector the norm in the past months.
The magic behind this economic policy trick seems to be wearing off now, though. Private consumption fell in March for the first time in years. So, why is Sheinbaum’s economic performance being categorised as “good” here?
It’s the president’s proactive realism. Sheinbaum knows that the US will continue to be an unreliable business partner and that domestic consumption as a source of growth is reaching its limits. So, early in her tenure she launched Mexico’s first comprehensive industrial policy in decades: Plan México.
The Mexico Political Economist has done a full multi-part breakdown of the policies that make up the Plan. Suffice it to say that behind its many promises, the most important proposals lie in what the government can do best—provide the key infrastructure for the business sector to invest upon.
Many businesses are responding positively. Whether they will invest will depend on what happens with the next two sections below.
The bad: Government insecurity
Sheinbaum’s concerted security strategy has deviated significantly from her predecessors’. Instead of depending entirely on a full frontal military approach, this government is mixing in a heavy dose of intelligence.
It has already been working. Homicide is down by 25% since Sheinbaum took office. In large part this is because her government is taking the fight to organised crime where it hurts them most—their bank accounts.
Intelligence operations have doubled down on tracing sources of corruption in local government and hunting down illegal money flows. Mexico’s Financial Intelligence Unit’s investigations into financial crimes are up 67% this year compared to the same period in 2024.
The exception that has proved the rule has been Sinaloa, where a cartel civil war has increased violence significantly. The reason: A return to the old “decapitation” strategy where the US and local Mexican actors (unbeknownst to the Sheibbaum administration) triggered the conflict through the kidnapping and extradition of one of the Sinaloa Cartel’s top bosses.
So, if everything is going so well, why is security in the “bad” section?
Intelligence is working so well that the government wants to double down. In recent days, Sheinbaum and her allies in Congress pushed through a raft of legislation that amounts to the creation of what The Mexico Political Economist, intelligence experts, and human rights lawyers have called the creation of a police state apparatus.
Read our full breakdown here, but overall the government’s intelligence approach to security is being used to justify huge and onerous surveillance on the entirety of Mexico.
This surveillance state is on Sheinbaum, who went out of her way to use her presidential bully pulpit to convince Mexicans that the reforms would only be used for good. In other ways, the president’s hands are tied. They are cuffed not by an opposition—which is currently impotent—but by questionable political interests within her own party. This is where things get ugly
The ugly: The mean justifying the means
The reform that would forever change the makeup of Mexico’s judicial branch was passed before Sheinbaum rose to office. She was left holding the bag; forced to implement a poorly designed election of all of Mexico’s judges and magistrates at every level. The president chose the bandaid method—rip it off and get the pain over and done with.
And so Mexico’s first judicial election happened a few weeks ago and was marred by its poor organisation and worrying omens for Mexican justice. Predictably, attention has moved on from the judicial question, giving Sheinbaum some breathing space to govern in her own way.
What she can’t rip off like a bandaid is her party, Morena. Like the judicial reform, she has inherited a series of power brokers from the López Obrador age in whose charge the unity of the movement lies. But at what cost?
Corruption and malfeasance accompany many of the allies Sheinbaum must work with. She has often said that politics is ultimately about being able to get things done. But as her so-called allies water down legislation clearly to serve their own self-interest, or force her to defend incredibly unpopular Morena governors accused in the US of being linked to cartels, the president must be asking herself if these alliances are worth the reputational cost.
The defense of the corrupt to achieve governability is creating a monster uncontrolled by anyone, even the president. It is a mix of party cadres and pro-Morena supporters who spring into action whenever anyone questions any member of the ruling coalition. The result has been the knee jerk attack of journalists usually allied with the president who are caught in the treasonable offense of doing their jobs; that is questioning the most powerful woman in Mexico.
We are yet to see what route will dominate the rest of Sheinbaum’s term. For now, her administration’s report card remains mixed.
The Mexico Political Economist is the only English-language outlet making sense of the noise surrounding Mexican politics, policy, and economics. Do consider becoming a full paying subscriber or inviting your contacts to support independent journalism in an uncertain media landscape. Join the ranks of global government officials, journalists, diplomats, and top business and thought leaders the world round: