Mexico’s Sheinbaum sees record approval rating as she celebrates one year in office • FRANCE 24

Mexico’s Sheinbaum sees record approval rating as she celebrates one year in office • FRANCE 24

This is Appropo. Well, she’s not just survived a year of diplomatic wrangling with Donald Trump and fighting cartel violence, but according to pundits, has been thriving on it. Mexican President Claudia Shenbomb has been assailed by selfie seeking supporters over the past month as she reports back to voters on her first year in office. While she enjoys an approval rating of about 70%, she’s also been criticized in some quarters over her record on crime. As Selena Sykes reports, on the 15th of September in Mexico City, Independence Day felt like more of an event than usual. For the first time in the country’s history, a woman delivered the traditional cry that kicked off celebrations. independencia. Claudia Shanebum, the first female president of Mexico, was elected by an overwhelming majority in June 2024. Popularity that has remained intact a year into office. A survey in late August found that she had an approval rating of 79%, unprecedented for a leader in Latin America. The key to this success, the chamber method. self-discipline perhaps from her 14 years of classical dancing, a pragmatic approach almost certainly from her scientific background as a former member of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change and also cautiousness qualities that have allowed her to cope with Donald Trump’s unpredictable nature and get one of the lowest percentages of tariffs. She’s known not only how to manage North American politics, but how to handle Trump himself. Concrete results also seen in other areas like the national poverty rate, which stood at just under 30% in 2024 compared to 42% in 2018. A decrease largely driven by her predecessor, mentor Andres Manuel Lopez Orador, who inspired Shane Bomb’s policies on women’s rights and minorities. among other issues. There have been several big changes. For example, the support she’s given the elderly. That’s been the most important to us. A first year full of success, but there are also a lot of challenges left to tackle. The fight against corruption, drug trafficking, and cartel violence. Huge, complicated tasks. while Trump is demanding quick results. Otherwise, more tariffs could be coming Mexico’s way in November. Well, for more, let’s bring in Ernesto Castana, director of the Center for Latin American and Latino Studies and the Immigration Lab at the American University in Washington. Ernesto, thanks so much for being with us on the program. So, one year in, the Mexican president remains extremely popular among voters, more so than the five heads of state who preceded her. What explains it? That’s right. I mean, without a doubt, this is a historical presidency. It’s the first time that Mexico has a female leader. Uh, she is Jewish, part of a religious minority, and she has been very distinguished doing uh this job. She has been very coldheaded at the same time that she’s warm with the people. She has shown a lot of respect to the poor, to uh the indigenous people, to women in a way that is not just part of the speeches or the discourse or performative or in electoral times, but even once elected president as we can see in the images, she’s warm. She wants to feel close to the people and she is interested in governing well, governing for everybody and also keeping at the same time humble and accepting that there going to be mistakes make and that she’s not perfect, that she’s not the savior of Mexico, but she’s a servant of the country. So, I think that’s working really well internally and internationally. Another thing that I think is been super successful is, as you were saying, the way that she’s dealing with Donald Trump. She has done a master class on how to do it. She has been coolheaded. She was she has not been tit for tat uh debating online or uh in person against the president even when he says inappropriate things. But she has not seated ground publicly as she has been able to negotiate very effectively being respectful and at the same time gaining the respect of President Trump which is not an easy feat to do. Yeah. and she famously joked that the US would be renamed Mexican Mexican America back in January after Trump had talked about changing the name of the Gulf of Mexico. Has she changed her tone though when it comes to the US president since then? And is that how she has managed to gain his respect? That was one of the few exceptions when she uh play along and she tried to uh retort uh with a with a comic uh response. Uh but most of the time she has been very self-measured. She hasn’t played along and she has um reiterated that she is there to uh do what’s best for for Mexicans and that she’s open to cooperate with the US in issues that are important for both countries. Trade, immigration, the environment, uh drug trafficking, but that Mexico is a sovereign country. So that plays really well with the nationalistic discourse within Mexico. at the same time that is a diplomatic and open to cooperation indeed on this area. So it’s been a very hard balance to keep but she has done it uh very well. She’s extremely popular as we say but she has faced criticism as well over her government’s efforts to combat crime also on the stance she’s taken on Gaza. So what kind of challenges lie ahead for her going into this second year do you think Ernest President Shamb and Mexico in general face uh enormous changes uh the population is aging uh population birth is declining or uh birth rates are declining so it’s a time when Mexico needs immigrants and it’s at the same time uh Mexico has played a key role in reducing the number of people that arrived to the US Mexico border And following the lines of Lopez, Manuel Lopez Oador, the the previous president, Mexico has been deporting more Central Americans than the US. And I think part of the challenges that she and others want to do uh is how to make sure that some immigrants can call Mexico home, that some uh people can get asylum and become refugees and settle in Mexico while also keeping uh the immigration uh topic in order in terms of the US Mexico border. again a very very difficult task but she has delivered for the US and that’s why she has gotten a lot of support quietly from the United States um but there’s many challenges uh violence is a big issue in Mexico uh against women but in general uh drug trafficking uh the using the military to fight against them from previous administration has not worked uh the the previous president supposedly was going to make agreements and be more diplomatic with the with the drug trafficking he didn’t really change the way Mexico dealt with the drug trafficking cartels. There’s obviously issues of corruption. So, there are huge problems, but they will face any president. Whoever it was, a man for for whatever party, it’ll be the same challenges that are very hard to tackle. But she’s uh been patient and she’s been as as intelligent as possible uh dealing with this, but it’s something that’s going to take a lot of time uh to fix. And she and her Canadian counterpart, they’re going to be preparing to take on Washington again next year during the review of their three-way free trade deal. How important and significant a moment will that be for the Mexican economy? It’s very important. uh Mexican economy is really really connected to the US economy and the tariffs that were uh proposed by President Trump would really hurt uh the American the Mexican economy, the American economy too, but also the prospects of growth uh of of Mexico which was almost counting with a near shoring uh of many industries moving from China to Mexico closer to the US and Canadian markets for uh for more prosperity for Mexico finally becoming a a wealthy country uh more developed but we are seeing a lot of struggles on that area. So it’s been a a tight line to um to to walk uh between continuing trade with China but as we saw today now there’s also more tariffs that have increased uh with Mexico visa v Chinese made woods. So it’s part of the pressure that uh the Trump administration has put on Mexico. Um, and it’s a it’s a tight thing because the agreement had already NAFTA had already been negotiated by the Trump administration and they had uh come to an agreement and now Trump again is asking to negotiate putting Mexico and Canada in a tough position. But it’s good that Canada and Mexico working together to have a united front. They’re more likely to have a stronger uh position to negotiate from with the US administration. And as we say, her approval ratings, they’d be the envy of of most world leaders really. But do you think she’s kept a relatively low pro profile on the global stage? We didn’t see her at the UN General Assembly for example in New York last week. That is correct. She’s been very careful in accepting that she has a lot of work to do in Mexico that she has uh a tough position to play in terms of diplomacy already with the United States and Canada. and she’s following a little bit uh on the steps of uh Lopez Orador who was also rarely at these international gatherings something that goes against the tradition of foreign Mexican presidents who will be part of these multilateral uh meetings. Uh Amllo did not attend and she hasn’t attended much which I think is useful at a time that a lot of the speeches at the UN were disastrous. They were very polical and many people were dissatisfied with many of the speeches. So I think she was wise in in in not trying to to show herself and not to let her ego take the best out of her and stay at home. I think in this in this UN meeting that was probably the smartest thing to do. And do you think that her you know support among voters it’s going to continue domestically she has faced some scandals within her own political circle in terms of corruption allegations. Yes. uh in some way the she owes uh her position to her predecessor to Amllo as we call him in Mexico and she uh depends and and needed the party of Morena to get elected and to have the support that she has and the control of Congress and now the courts. So the negative thing is that that has given her a lot of support, popularity and uh network across the country. But then she’s also has to respond for the corruption and the excesses and the mistakes of members of that party. Uh which is which is a a heavy thing to do. And then also unfortunately Mexico in a way Mexico used to have a one party system for many decades until 2000. And now that party is is weaker, the PRI, but now the party of Shamb uh is the it’s become a one party system that dominates most areas of politics in Mexico that uh some some critics say that there’s been a a democratic backsliding uh as as this this party now has also control of the courts which are not an elected position. So the the the opposition uh the center and and right-wing parties are very critical of that concentration of of power in her party. And just finally before we let you go, not surprisingly perhaps she’s very popular with female voters, housewives in particular. What has she done to improve the lives of women over the past year? Yeah, I mean symbolically but I think also realistically she has uh given a lot of um highlighting to indigenous women, people that were invisible that were seen as lesser than throughout Mexican history. and she has included the the the the figures, the images of indigenous women in a lot of the official documents and uh signs and and um designs that the Mexican government is using. So that has gone a long way and she’s talking and he’s showing that women are equally capable of being president of Mexico and being CEOs and being she also has has a background in science. So, I think that goes a long way to showing that Mexican uh women can do as well as anybody else. And even though there’s the stereotype that people in Mexico are very masculine, um in in the cities, in the middle class, women have for a long time been treated equally as men. And she shows this. Ernesto Casta, thanks so much for being with us on the program this evening. Well, that’s

With an approval rating of 79 percent in late August, up from around 70 percent after she took office, Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum has not just survived a year of diplomatic wrangling with US President Donald Trump and fighting cartel violence, she is thriving on it. FRANCE 24’s Sharon Gaffney speaks with Ernesto Castaneda, Director of the Centre for Latin American and Latino Studies and the Immigration Lab at the American University in Washington, about the secret to her success.
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