Daily Homicides in the nation Decline Thirty-Seven Percent During President Sheinbaum, As per Government Figures

The typical count of daily murders monthly in Mexico has decreased by more than a third since President Claudia Sheinbaum took office, according to fresh official data. However, security specialists have advised that homicide data could fail to signal better countrywide stability.

Notable Reduction in Daily Numbers

There was an average of close to 55 murders a day in last November as opposed to nearly 87 when Sheinbaum assumed the leadership in the previous September. This announcement was delivered by the director of the country’s federal public security system, Marcela Figueroa Franco, during the leader's daily news conference on a recent Tuesday.

“The figures in homicides that we have seen over these past months is remarkably notable,” Sheinbaum said, adding that in November the lowest amount of murders were registered for any single November in the last 10 years.

Recent Background and Official Strategy

Intense drug cartel infighting, combined with the government’s heavily military efforts to take on the trafficking organizations, have led to Mexico’s homicide rate escalate in recent years. The rate reached a peak of 36,773 killings in 2020, as reported by the country’s official data office.

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

At a news briefing in the summer, the head of state said: “We have a strategy, there is oversight of the strategy, and there is specific tracking locality by locality in certain cases. The strategy works. And we have to keep working at it daily.”

The central elements of Sheinbaum’s security strategy encompass:

• Strengthening Mexico’s national guard.
• Enhancing information gathering and investigative capabilities.
• Increased collaboration between various departments.

Expert Warnings and Statistical Concerns

But, security researchers warned that focusing solely on homicide data to draw a conclusion of pacification was misleading. This is particularly true considering the rise in other criminal activities such as people going missing.

“It would be very good information if this was a drop, but I think we must not just concentrate on the homicide data and say: ‘Alright, excellent,’” stated Cecilia Farfán-Méndez, an expert on Mexican organised crime. “I would be cautiously positive.”

Per the public policy research organization Mexico Evalúa, killings in total dropped by more than 20% in the initial 10 months of this year relative to the identical timeframe the previous year. However, disappearances have gone up by 15% and in some states have surged by up to 200%.

“Data on homicides is no longer useful for estimating the context of public insecurity,” argued Armando Vargas, a security analyst at Mexico Evalúa. “Firstly, we have police and investigators who lack the capacity or the will to accurately recognize and categorize bodies. Second, organized [criminals] … have the capability to hide violence through abductions.”

Vargas noted that using monthly averages of everyday killings was additionally concerning because it could hide periods when there were especially high numbers of murders.

“Using the per-day average makes high peaks of violence invisible,” he concluded.

Detentions and Confiscations as Measures of Success

Where the government can point to the effectiveness of its security plan is on arrests and seizures. Almost 40,000 suspects were detained between last October and November 2025 for serious offenses, per official figures. More than 20,000 guns were seized and 311 tonnes of narcotics seized.

“The former US president cannot accuse President Sheinbaum of not acting, because in reality she is accomplishing a lot with these thousands of arrests, thousands of confiscations, and all the tactical weakening of criminal groups. It’s very politically advantageous,” said Vargas.

Persistent Violence and Societal Frustration

Yet despite these efforts, Mexico is still grappling with extreme bloodshed, with a number of regions in the throes of cartel-related violence. Last month there was a notable assassination of a well-liked mayor in the state of Michoacan, one of 10 local leaders assassinated in the last year.

Weeks after, many thousands of young people demonstrated in the capital and across the country to voice their anger at graft and narco-violence.

“The federal government presents [data] in a way to construct a story of security. From a political standpoint it’s highly effective, socially it’s extremely debatable,” Vargas concluded.