Daily Killings in Mexico Fall 37% Under Claudia Sheinbaum, Per Government Figures

The average count of everyday murders each month in the country has decreased by thirty-seven percent since President Claudia Sheinbaum began her term, according to recent administrative data. Nevertheless, security analysts have cautioned that murder numbers could fail to indicate improved national safety.

Notable Reduction in Per-Day Averages

There was an average of almost 55 killings a day in November versus roughly 87 when Sheinbaum began the presidency in the previous September. This announcement was delivered by the chief of the nation's federal public security agency, Marcela Figueroa Franco, during the leader's daily news conference on a recent Tuesday.

“The outcome in homicides that we have seen over these past months is extremely notable,” Sheinbaum stated, noting that the previous month the least figure of homicides were registered for any single November in the past 10 years.

Historical Context and Official Strategy

Fierce cartel internal conflicts, alongside the administration's highly military campaigns to take on the trafficking organizations, have led to Mexico’s murder rate soar in the past few years. The figure peaked at a record high of 36,773 killings in 2020, as reported by the country’s national statistics agency.

That meant Mexico a murder figure more than 4x greater than that of the United States. From that point, homicides have been on the downward trend, dropping to 33,550 in the last calendar year. The President has credited her public safety plan for an ostensibly sharper decline in homicides in the current year.

At a press conference in the summer, the President said: “We have a strategy, we have monitoring of the plan, and we have detailed tracking municipality by municipality in some cases. The plan functions. And we have to keep working at it each day.”

The central pillars of Sheinbaum’s security strategy include:

• Bolstering Mexico’s domestic security force.
• Advancing intelligence and investigative work.
• Increased collaboration between government agencies.

Analyst Warnings and Data Limitations

However, public safety researchers warned that using murder numbers to draw a conclusion of peace was misleading. This is notably true in light of the uptick in other crimes such as people going missing.

“This would be excellent information if this were a decrease, but I think we shouldn't just concentrate on the homicide numbers and say: ‘Alright, great,’” said Cecilia Farfán-Méndez, an authority on Mexico's cartels. “I would be cautiously hopeful.”

Per the public policy research organization Mexico Evalúa, homicides in total dropped by more than 20% in the initial 10 months of the current year versus the same period the previous year. Yet, missing persons cases have gone up by 15% and in certain states have risen by as much as 200%.

“Data on murders is no longer useful for assessing the reality of public insecurity,” argued Armando Vargas, a safety analyst at Mexico Evalúa. “Firstly, we have police and investigators who do not have the resources or the desire to accurately recognize and categorize remains. Secondly, organised [criminals] … have the capability to mask violence through abductions.”

Vargas added that relying on monthly means of everyday homicides was similarly an issue because it could obscure days when there were notably spiking levels of murders.

“Using the daily mean renders high peaks of violence unseen,” he said.

Detentions and Confiscations as Metrics of Success

An area where the administration can point to the effectiveness of its safety plan is on detentions and confiscations. Almost 40,000 individuals were arrested between October 2024 and November 2025 for major crimes, according to official data. More than 20,000 firearms were taken and 311 tons of narcotics confiscated.

“Trump cannot claim President Sheinbaum of not acting, because in reality she is doing a lot with these thousands of detentions, many thousands of confiscations, and all the operational weakening of organised crime. It’s very politically advantageous,” said Vargas.

Persistent Violence and Public Anger

Yet despite these measures, Mexico continues to be plagued by severe bloodshed, with a number of regions in the midst of cartel-fueled bloodshed. Last month there was a notable murder of a well-liked local official in the state of Michoacan, one of 10 local leaders killed in the past 12 months.

A short time after, thousands of protesters demonstrated in the capital and throughout the nation to express their anger at graft and drug violence.

“The administration shares [data] in a way to construct a story of safety. From a political standpoint it’s highly successful, socially it’s extremely problematic,” the analyst remarked.