Mayors in Mexico targeted in drug-related violence

The fatal shooting of a mayor in the eastern Mexican state of Morelos this week brought to 14 the number of city leaders who have been killed nationwide since President Claudia Sheinbaum took office in 2024.

Being a mayor in Mexico is dangerous: 26 were murdered in the six-year rule of Sheinbaum’s predecessor, showing how regional governments are increasingly controlled by cartels, an academic told El País; a politician warned that they “have been left to face organized crime on their own.”

Local mayors may also be easier targets than the Mexican federal leaders and US government officials behind high-profile crackdowns: Washington on Thursday announced what it called the “largest action ever targeting” of the Jalisco cartel.