Salvador, Brazil – Mexico’s President Claudia Sheinbaum announced Wednesday that she filed a criminal complaint after being sexually accosted a day before on the streets of Mexico City.
“I decided to report this because it’s something I’ve experienced as a woman, but something we women experience in our country,” said the leader during a press conference Wednesday. “I haven’t experienced this before. Not before I was president, not when I was a student, nor when I was a young person. But it is a crime in Mexico City. Not in all states in the Republic [of Mexico] is this a crime, but in Mexico City it is.”
Sheinbaum was a few feet away from the Palacio Nacional, the executive headquarters, and was heading to a conference at the Department of Education.
She stopped to take pictures and greet supporters when a man wearing a blue, button-down dress shirt approached her from behind, put a hand on her shoulder and moved his hands to her breasts, according to a video circulating on social media. He was quickly stopped by members of the president’s security detail and was detained, according to the president.
#MañaneraDelPueblo | La presidenta @Claudiashein denunció penalmente el acoso del que fue víctima ayer en la Ciudad de México.
“Mi reflexión es que si no presento delito, ¿en qué condición quedan las mujeres mexicanas?”
Anunció que comenzará una campaña contra este delito e… pic.twitter.com/prLr9UZksl
— Gobierno de México (@GobiernoMX) November 5, 2025
Sheinbaum said she did not understand what was happening at first and only realized the assault after watching the videos taken of the man who was, she added, clearly “drunk” or “drugged”.
“We continued walking until a completely drunk person arrived, and then I experienced this episode. And, at the time, I was actually talking to other people, I didn’t realize it immediately,” she stated. “Only later, with the videos, did I realize what had happened.”
“And my reflection is: if I don’t file a criminal complaint, which is more than just a crime, what will become of Mexican women? If this happens to the president, it will happen to all the women in the country.”
A 2021 report from the country’s National Institute of Statistics and Geography (INEGI) found that 49.7% of Mexican women experienced sexual violence at some point in their lives, while 23.3 % had experienced this in the 12 months leading up to the survey.
Sheinbaum announced that the government will create a campaign against sexual harassment and also argued that it should be considered a crime in all of the country’s states.
All of Mexico’s 32 states have their own penal code. Sixteen states – including Chihuahua, Oaxaca and Baja California – do not specify sexual harassment in public as a distinct crime. In August, Oaxaca made changes to its penal code to be stricter on sexual assault.
She also said the episode won’t change her behavior when it comes to personally being in the streets, and “they need to be next to people,” denying that any potential risks were informed by the Security Office.
Featured image: Claudia Sheinbaum addresses a press conference on November 5, 2025.
Image credit: Gobierno de México via YouTube.
