Drug-related violence has long swept Mexico into chaos and turmoil. But this year’s brutal killings of political candidates sent shocking waves even with the normalization of violence there.
The bloodiest Mexico election in recent memory was marked by the killing of dozens of local candidates and more than 100 violent political events involving kidnappings, attempted murders, and attacks on family members, according to various reports.
The targeted killings included Jorge Huerta Cabrera, a candidate running for a seat council in Izucar de Matamoros. He was shot dead at a rally where his wife and a colleague were also wounded.
Days earlier in May, Alfredo Cabrera, a mayoral candidate in the state of Guerrero was gunned down. The same month, nine people were killed in two attacks against mayoral candidates in Chiapas.
The two leading female presidential candidates weren’t targeted or at least didn’t face attempts on their lives — thankfully.
President-elect Claudia Sheinbaum, who will be sworn in on Oct. 1 as the country’s first female president, is widely expected to follow the policies and tactics of outgoing president Andrés Manuel Lopez Obrador, who has dismissed the violence as “sensationalism.”
In Mexico, like in so many other places in the world, the political violence is carried out deliberately by organized crime seeking to influence elections and ultimately seize a grip on government at all levels, experts have told media outlets.
Simply put, Mexico has normalized political assassinations, drug-related killings, kidnappings, and extortion.
Criminals and assassins seemingly go unpunished, blatantly taking control of certain towns and entire regions of the country where residents can’t tell the bad actors from the government.
TYT Newsroom
