Murders, tariffs, Mexico’s relationship with China and the 11-year-old Ayotzinapa case involving the disappearance of 43 students were among the topics President Claudia Sheinbaum spoke about at her Friday morning press conference.
Later on Friday, Sheinbaum traveled to Ciudad Juárez, Chihuahua, where she delivered yet another speech on her nationwide “accountability tour.”
Thursday was Mexico’s least violent day in years
Just before the end of her mañanera, Sheinbaum acknowledged that 37 homicides were recorded on Thursday.
“Yesterday was the lowest number of homicides for at least 10 years, I think,” she said before conceding that she wasn’t sure that Thursday was actually the least violent day in a decade.
“Let us know,” Sheinbaum said.
In fact, the murder count on Thursday was the lowest number of homicides on a single day in Mexico since December 2018, or almost seven years, according to media reports. Twelve of Mexico’s 32 federal entities reported no homicides on Thursday, while Guanajuato recorded the highest number with six.
(Juan Carlos Buenrostro / Presidencia)
Sheinbaum played down the importance of the (comparably) low number of homicides on Thursday, a figure 46% below the daily average in the first eight months of 2025.
She indicated that she was more interested in seeing the homicide data for the entire month of September, before noting that the number of murders in August was 32% lower than September 2024, the last month of Andrés Manuel López Obrador’s presidency.
In the first eight months of 2025, the average daily homicide rate was almost 25% lower than the daily average during 2024.
Sheinbaum has attributed the decline in homicides to the effectiveness of her government’s security strategy. On Friday morning, she said that “this idea” that not all homicides are being reported by the federal government is “false.”
‘We have very good relations with China,’ and tariffs are ‘a matter of strengthening our economy’
Sheinbaum noted that Economy Minister Marcelo Ebrard met on Thursday with China’s ambassador to Mexico.
The meeting took place two weeks after the president sent a proposal to Congress to implement tariffs of up to 50% on a wide range of goods from China and other countries with which Mexico doesn’t have trade agreements. This week, China’s Commerce Ministry initiated an investigation into the higher tariffs Mexico intends to implement.
Sheinbaum said that her government is proposing “high-level” talks with China on the issue, but she didn’t indicate any willingness to consider easing the proposed duties.
“Why was this decision taken? In [a period of] about four years, imports to our country [from China] increased by nearly 83% and [our] exports also increased. And what we want, … [with] Plan México, is to produce more in Mexico in order to have a trade balance where imports are not equal to exports,” she said, explaining that the goal is to maintain an overall trade surplus.
“At the moment we have a positive balance of trade,” Sheinbaum said before noting that the surplus is only “small.”
“… We want it to be bigger,” she said.
“… And that is the objective of the [proposed] tariffs,” Sheinbaum said, asserting that they are not specifically targeted at China as they will apply to all countries with which Mexico doesn’t have trade agreements.
“Obviously we’re interested in having dialogue [with those countries],” she said, adding that her government wants China to “understand” Mexico’s “situation.”
China has asserted that Mexico is acting “under coercion” from the United States “to constrain China,” but Mexican officials say that the primary goals of the proposed tariffs are to protect Mexican industry and reduce reliance on imports.
However, Mexico has faced pressure from the United States, and Canada, over its trade relationship with China as well as growing Chinese investment here. The decision to impose higher tariffs on imports from China, along with some other government measures and certain remarks by Mexican officials, indicate that Mexico is indeed yielding to that pressure — at least to some extent — ahead of the 2026 review of the USMCA free trade pact.
Despite Mexico’s less than uber-friendly attitude toward the East Asian economic powerhouse, Sheinbaum asserted on Friday that “we have very good relations with China.”
The decision to impose new tariffs on imports from that country and others is simply “a matter of strengthening our economy,” she said.
Sheinbaum restates her commitment to ‘truth and justice’ in Ayotzinapa case
On the 11th anniversary of the disappearance of 43 teachers’ college students in Guerrero, Sheinbaum reiterated her commitment to finding the “truth” and achieving “justice” in the unresolved case.
“We’re working on that,” she said. “There is a new special prosecutor. We have meetings with the families, with the mothers and fathers of the Ayotzinapa students.”
“Our commitment is to do everything in our power to reach the truth and justice, and to find the young men,” Sheinbaum said.
The remains of just three of the 43 students have been found. The young men were abducted in Iguala, Guerrero, on Sept. 26, 2014, and presumably killed some time after that.
The case — in which the army, municipal police and a crime gang called Guerreros Unidos were allegedly involved — shocked Mexico and triggered huge protests against the government of then-president Enrique Peña Nieto.
By Mexico News Daily chief staff writer Peter Davies ([email protected])
