Politics

Contributor: Mexico's president has notched some big wins, but she has a lot of work ahead

Published

8 months ago

May 4, 2025

Contributor: Mexico's president has notched some big wins, but she has a lot of work ahead

On a recent Friday morning, President Claudia Sheinbaum stood inside Mexico’s presidential palace during her daily morning news conference and was asked by one of the reporters whether she had talked with President Trump about a visit to the White House.

“We’ve talked about how nice it would be to meet in person, but there’s nothing formal yet,” Sheinbaum replied. “When necessary, we speak directly; but there is dialogue.”

At a time when Trump seems to be picking fights with allies the world over, and threatening tremendous tariffs on friends and foes, Mexico has emerged relatively unscathed, thanks in large part to the cool head and deal-making skills of its president.

Her powers of negotiation have earned Sheinbaum the kind of praise the American president usually reserves for strongmen and dictators, with Trump calling her a “very wonderful woman,” while the foreign press has been equally fawning.

The Washington Post called Sheinbaum “the world’s leading Trump whisperer,” while the New York Times mused she might be “the anti-Trump.” Bloomberg pondered if the Mexican leader was “the most powerful woman in the world.”

At home, she has also earned high praise for her efforts to manage Mexico’s most important bilateral relationship, and her approval ratings have soared from 70% when she took office in October to more than 80% in March, according to local newspaper El Financiero.

But even as Sheinbaum has rightfully been lauded for her efforts in handling her pugnacious and volatile counterpart north of the border, there remain a number of domestic issues that could mar her record of wins.

While the Mexican leader avoided the worst of Trump’s blanket tariffs, she is still contending with a 25% levy on cars, steel and aluminum that are sold in the U.S., which will no doubt hobble the Mexican economy: Last month, the International Monetary Fund revised its January projection of a 1.3% growth for the Mexico’s GDP to a 0.3% contraction in 2025. Mexicans would feel that, and Sheinbaum’s popularity could suffer.

And though murders have dropped sharply since she took office, according to state figures, security remains a critical issue in Mexico: A government poll released last month found that more than 6 out of 10 Mexicans living in cities felt unsafe.

With cartels controlling about a third of Mexico’s territory, according to estimates from the U.S. military, it’s not difficult to see why. Shortly after Sheinbaum took office, violence erupted in the northern city of Culiacán, where gangs murdered hundreds of people, gunfire ripped through the air in broad daylight and explosions tore through the night.

Perhaps most troubling of all is the number of disappearances, a long-running horror that continues apace. During Sheinbaum’s presidency, more than 8,000 people have gone missing, or an average of 41 people a day.

Since 1962, more than 120,000 people have disappeared or gone missing, according to official figures. Although such disappearances were once associated with the state, especially Mexico’s secret police, in recent decades the tactic has become a tool of cartels to exert control through terror.

The scale of the crisis was brought to the nation’s attention in March when a group of activist searchers came upon an abandoned ranch in the western state of Jalisco. Inside was a scene of unimaginable horror, one that recalled Nazi concentration camps: crematorium ovens, charred human remains, bone fragments.

Perhaps most heart-wrenching of all, there were also scores of backpacks, torn photographs, piles of clothes, hundreds of pairs of shoes. The “Mexican Auschwitz,” as it has been dubbed, became a national scandal that raged for weeks.

But as happens all too often in Mexico, the scandal remained just that. While the media described it as an extermination center, Sheinbaum sidestepped the idea in a news conference by suggesting it was a recruitment camp. Fingers were pointed; the governing Morena party blocked a bill to initiate a special commission to investigate the case.

When the U.N. Committee on Enforced Disappearances said last month that it would seek to bring the issue of forced disappearances in Mexico before the General Assembly under the argument that it was “systematic or widespread,” Sheinbaum accused them of being poorly informed.

If she cannot tackle the crisis of disappearances more directly, she is unlikely to hold on to that 80% approval rating.

Meanwhile, next month, Sheinbaum may face the greatest test of her presidency yet, with Mexico embarking on a first-ever election allowing voters to choose judges from the district level right up to the Supreme Court.

A final and deeply controversial reform pushed through by her predecessor, Andrés Manuel López Obrador, weeks before he left office, the election will see more than 3,000 candidates vying for 881 roles across the judiciary.

At best, the process promises to be chaotic, with the head of Mexico’s elections institute admitting that the agency isn’t prepared “in terms of the size of the task, how rushed it is, and the budget cuts it’s facing.”

At worst, the election could be marred by violence and its legitimacy called into question. Mexico’s last federal election was its most violent ever with 34 candidates murdered during the campaign. With organized crime infecting almost every corner of Mexican life, this election could also be bloody: Last month, the Senate majority leader admitted that some of the judicial candidates had links to criminal groups.

And even if the election runs smoothly, with candidates favored by the governing Morena party likely to come out on top, the ruling party would have control of the executive, the legislative and the judicial branches of government. This would drag Mexico back toward the one-party rule that it endured throughout much of the 20th century. It would also raise expectations about how much Sheinbaum should be able to accomplish, with such party unity behind her.

During a speech in January, Sheinbaum defended the judicial election as an exercise in democracy and a means to root out corruption. Whether that’s true or not remains to be seen, but with her global star on the rise, the world will be carefully watching.

Oscar Lopez is a Mexican author and journalist based in Mexico City working on a book about the origins of forced disappearance during Mexico’s Dirty War.

Politics

Video: Protests Against ICE in Minneapolis Continue Into Friday Night

Published

5 hours ago

January 11, 2026

Press Room

Video: Protests Against ICE in Minneapolis Continue Into Friday Night

new video loaded: Protests Against ICE in Minneapolis Continue Into Friday Night

transcript

Protests Against ICE in Minneapolis Continue Into Friday Night

Hundreds of protesters marched through downtown Minneapolis on Friday night. They stopped at several hotels along the way to blast music, bang drums and play instruments to try to disrupt the sleep of immigration agents who might be staying there. Mayor Jacob Frey of Minneapolis said there were 29 arrests but that it was mostly a “peaceful protest.”

: The vast majority of people have done this right. We are so deeply appreciative of them. But we have seen a few incidents last night. Those incidents are being reviewed, but we wanted to again give the overarching theme of what we’re seeing, which is peaceful protest. And we wanted to say when that doesn’t happen, of course, there are consequences. We are a safe city. We will not counter Donald Trump’s chaos with our own brand of chaos here. We in Minneapolis are going to do this right.
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Hundreds of protesters marched through downtown Minneapolis on Friday night. They stopped at several hotels along the way to blast music, bang drums and play instruments to try to disrupt the sleep of immigration agents who might be staying there. Mayor Jacob Frey of Minneapolis said there were 29 arrests but that it was mostly a “peaceful protest.”

By McKinnon de Kuyper

January 10, 2026

Politics

Trump says Venezuela has begun releasing political prisoners ‘in a BIG WAY’

Published

6 hours ago

January 11, 2026

Press Room

Trump says Venezuela has begun releasing political prisoners ‘in a BIG WAY’

NEWYou can now listen to Fox News articles!

President Donald Trump said Saturday that Venezuela has begun releasing political prisoners “in a BIG WAY,” crediting U.S. intervention for the move following last week’s American military operation in the country.

“Venezuela has started the process, in a BIG WAY, of releasing their political prisoners,” Trump wrote on Truth Social. “Thank you! I hope those prisoners will remember how lucky they got that the USA came along and did what had to be done.”

He added a warning directed at those being released: “I HOPE THEY NEVER FORGET! If they do, it will not be good for them.”

The president’s comments come one week after the United States launched Operation Absolute Resolve, a strike on Venezuela and capture of dictator Nicolás Maduro as well as his wife Cilia Flores, transporting them to the United States to face federal drug trafficking charges.

US WARNS AMERICANS TO LEAVE VENEZUELA IMMEDIATELY AS ARMED MILITIAS SET UP ROADBLOCKS

Government supporters in Venezuela rally in Caracas. (AP Photo)

Following the military operation, Trump said the U.S. intends to temporarily oversee Venezuela’s transition of power, asserting American involvement “until such time as a safe, proper and judicious transition” can take place and warning that U.S. forces stand ready to escalate if necessary.

At least 18 political prisoners were reported freed as of Saturday and there is no comprehensive public list of all expected releases, Reuters reported.

Maduro and Flores were transported to New York after their capture to face charges in U.S. federal court. The Pentagon has said that Operation Absolute Resolve involved more than 150 aircraft and months of planning.

TRUMP ADMIN SAYS MADURO CAPTURE REINFORCES ALIEN ENEMIES ACT REMOVALS

A demonstrator holding a Venezuelan flag sprays graffiti during a march in Mexico City on Santurday. (Alfredo Estrella / AFP via Getty Images)

Trump has said the U.S. intends to remain actively involved in Venezuela’s security, political transition and reconstruction of its oil infrastructure.

The White House did not immediately respond to Fox News Digital’s request for comment.

President Donald Trump said Saturday that Venezuela has begun releasing political prisoners. (Mark Schiefelbein/AP Photo)

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Fox News Digital’s Morgan Phillips and Greg Norman-Diamond contributed to this reporting.

Jasmine Baehr is a Breaking News Writer for Fox News Digital, where she covers politics, the military, faith and culture.

Politics

Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth tours Long Beach rocket factory

Published

7 hours ago

January 11, 2026

Press Room

Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth tours Long Beach rocket factory

Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth, who is taking a tour of U.S. defense contractors, on Friday visited a Long Beach rocket maker, where he told workers they are key to President Trump’s vision of military supremacy.

Hegseth stopped by a manufacturing plant operated by Rocket Lab, an emerging company that builds satellites and provides small-satellite launch services for commercial and government customers.

Last month, the company was awarded an $805-million military contract, its largest to date, to build satellites for a network being developed for communications and detection of new threats, such as hypersonic missles.

“This company, you right here, are front and center, as part of ensuring that we build an arsenal of freedom that America needs,” Hegseth told several hundred cheering workers. “The future of the battlefield starts right here with dominance of space.”

Founded in 2006 in New Zealand, the company makes a small rocket called Electron — which lay on its side near Hegseth — and is developing a larger one called Neutron. It moved to the U.S. a decade ago and opened its Long Beach headquaters in 2020.

Rocket Lab is among a new wave of companies that have revitalized Southern California’s aerospace and defense industry, which shed hundreds of thousands of jobs in the 1990s after the end of the Cold War. Large defense contractors such as Northrop Grumman and Lockheed Martin moved their headquarters to the East Coast.

Many of the new companies were founded by former employees of SpaceX, which was started by Elon Musk in 2002 and was based in the South Bay before moving to Texas in 2024. However, it retains major operations in Hawthorne.

Hegseth kicked off his tour Monday with a visit to a Newport News, Va., shipyard. The tour is described as “a call to action to revitalize America’s manufacturing might and re-energize the nation’s workforce.”

Long Beach Mayor Rex Richardson, a Democrat who said he was not told of the event, said Hegseth’s visit shows how the city has flourished despite such setbacks as the closure of Boeing’s C-17 Globemaster III transport plant.

“Rocket Lab has really been a superstar in terms of our fast, growing and emerging space economy in Long Beach,” Richardson said. “This emergence of space is really the next stage of almost a century of innovation that’s really taking place here.”

Prior stops in the region included visits to Divergent, an advanced manufacturing company in aerospace and other industries, and Castelion, a hypersonic missile startup founded by former SpaceX employees. Both are based in Torrance.

The tour follows an overhaul of the Department of Defense’s procurement policy Hegseth announced in November. The policy seeks to speed up weapons development and acquisition by first finding capabilities in the commercial market before the government attempts to develop new systems.

Trump also issued an executive order Wednesday that aims to limit shareholder profits of defense contractors that do not meet production and budget goals by restricting stock buybacks and dividends.

Hegseth told the workers that the administration is trying to prod old-line defense contractors to be more innovative and spend more on development — touting Rocket Lab as the kind of company that will succeed, adding it had one of the “coolest factory floors” he had ever seen.

“I just want the best, and I want to ensure that the competition that exists is fair,” he said.

Hegseth’s visit comes as Trump has flexed the nation’s military muscles with the Jan. 3 abduction of Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro, who is now facing drug trafficking charges to which he has pleaded not guilty.

Hegseth in his speech cited Maduro’s capture as an example of the country’s newfound “deterrence in action.” Though Trump’s allies supported the action, legal experts and other critics have argued that the operation violated international and U.S. law.

Trump this week said he wants to radically boost U.S. military spending to $1.5 trillion in 2027 from $900 billion this year so he can build the “Dream Military.”

Hegseth told the workers it would be a “historic investment” that would ensure the U.S. is never challenged militarily.

Trump also posted on social media this week that executive salaries of defense companies should be capped at $5 million unless they speed up development and production of advanced weapons — in a dig at existing prime contractors.

However, the text of his Wednesday order caps salaries at current levels and ties future executive incentive compensation to delivery and production metrics.

Anduril Industries in Costa Mesa is one of the leading new defense companies in Southern California. The privately held maker of autonomous weapons systems closed a $2.5-billion funding round last year.

Founder Palmer Luckey told Bloomberg News he supported Trump’s moves to limit executive compensation in the defense sector, saying, “I pay myself $100,000 a year.” However, Luckey has a stake in Anduril, last valued by investors at $30.5 billion.

Peter Beck, the founder and chief executive of Rocket Lab, took a base salary of $575,000 in 2024 but with bonus and stock awards his total compensation reached $20.1 million, according to a securities filing. He also has a stake in the company, which has a market capitalization of about $45 billion.

Beck introduced Hegseth saying he was seeking to “reinvigorate the national industrial base and create a leaner, more effective Department of War, one that goes faster and leans on commercial companies just like ours.”

Rocket Lab boasts that its Electron rocket, which first launched in 2017, is the world’s leading small rocket and the second most frequently launched U.S. rocket behind SpaceX.

It has carried payloads for NASA, the U.S. Space Force and the National Reconnaissance Office, aside from commercial customers.

The company employs 2,500 people across facilities in New Zealand, Canada and the U.S., including in Virginia, Colorado and Mississippi.

Rocket Lab shares closed at $84.84 on Friday, up 2%.