The average number of daily killings per month in Mexico has dropped by 37% since President Claudia Sheinbaum took office last year, according to new government figures, but security analysts cautioned that homicide data may not indicate improved national security.
There was an average of nearly 55 murders a day in November compared with almost 87 when Sheinbaum assumed the presidency in September last year, the head of the country’s national public security system, Marcela Figueroa Franco, said during the president’s daily news conference on Tuesday.
“The result in homicides that we’ve had over these months is very significant,” Sheinbaum said, adding that last month the lowest number of murders were recorded for any November in the past 10 years.
Violent cartel infighting, and the government’s heavily militarised efforts to take on the drug gangs, have made Mexico’s murder rate soar in recent years, reaching a peak of 36,773 killings in 2020, according to the country’s national statistics agency.
That gave Mexico a murder rate more than four times higher than the US. Since then, however, murders have been on the decline, dropping to 33,550 last year. Sheinbaum has credited her national security strategy for an apparently sharper decline in killings this year.
At a press conference in August, the Mexican leader said: “There is a strategy, there is monitoring of the strategy, and there is specific monitoring municipality by municipality in some cases. The strategy works. And we have to keep working at it every day.”
The key pillars of Sheinbaum’s security plan include strengthening Mexico’s national guard, improving intelligence and investigation efforts, and greater coordination between government agencies.
But security analysts cautioned that using homicide numbers to paint a picture of pacification was problematic, particularly given the increase in other crimes such as forced disappearances.
“It would be excellent news if this were a reduction, but I think we can’t just focus on the homicide data and say: ‘Oh well, great,’” Cecilia Farfán-Méndez, an expert on Mexican organised crime, said. “I would be cautiously optimistic.”
According to the public policy analysis thinktank Mexico Evalúa, murders overall dropped by more than 20% in the first 10 months of this year compared with the same period last year, but disappearances have increased by 15% and in some states have risen by as much as 200%.
“Data on homicides is no longer valid for estimating the context of public insecurity,” said Armando Vargas, a security expert at Mexico Evalúa. “Firstly, we have police and prosecutors who lack the capacity or the will to properly identify and classify corpses. Secondly, organised [criminals] … have the ability to conceal violence through disappearances.”
Vargas noted that using monthly averages of daily killings was also problematic because it might obscure days when there were particularly high numbers of murders.
“Using the daily average makes high peaks of violence invisible,” he said.
Where the government can point to the success of its security strategy is on arrests and seizures: nearly 40,000 people were arrested between October 2024 and November 2025 for high-impact crimes, according to government figures. More than 20,000 firearms were seized and 311 tons of drugs confiscated.
Vargas said: “Donald Trump cannot accuse President Sheinbaum of doing nothing, because in reality she is doing a lot with these thousands of arrests, thousands of seizures, and all the operational weakening of organised crime. It’s very politically profitable.”
But despite these efforts, Mexico continues to be plagued by extreme violence, with several states in the throes of cartel-driven bloodshed. Last month there was a high-profile killing of a popular mayor in the state of Michoacan, one of 10 mayors murdered in the past year.
Weeks later, thousands of young people took to the streets of Mexico City and across the country to voice their anger at corruption and drug violence.
Vargas said: “The federal government presents [data] in a way to construct a narrative of security. Politically it’s very effective, socially it’s very questionable.”
