Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum is pressing charges against a man who was caught on camera touching and attempting to kiss her during a public appearance on Tuesday.
Footage captured close to the National Palace in Mexico City showed a man approaching Sheinbaum as she spoke with a gathered crowd, placing his arm around the Mexican leader. In the video, the man moves to kiss Sheinbaum’s neck and place his hands on her upper body.
Sheinbaum quickly moves away and visibly flinches as the man attempts to put his arm around her. The man was arrested by authorities, said Mexico City mayor, Clara Brugada.
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Sheinbaum said in a press conference she had not immediately realized what was happening, and a member of her security team moved the man away. The man appeared to be drunk and had harassed other women in the same area, the president said.
“It was only after I saw the videos that I understood what really happened,” she said on Wednesday. “But I decided to file a complaint because this is something I experienced as a woman, and it is something women in this country experience.”
“If I don’t raise a complaint, even though this is a crime, where does that leave all Mexican women?,” Sheinbaum added. “If they do this to the president, then what happens to all the young women in our country?”
“President: you are not alone,” Brugada said in a statement posted to social media.
‘No Woman Is Immune’
There are nine sexual crimes committed against women for every one committed against a man in Mexico, according to data published by the country’s National Institute of Statistics and Geography last year. Experts say recorded cases of femicide, or the killing of women or girls because of their gender, have risen significantly in recent years. The overwhelming majority of sexual-based crimes are not reported to authorities or are not investigated.
In a scathing report released in 2021, Amnesty International said Mexico was “continuing to fail to fulfill its duty to investigate and, therefore, its duty to guarantee the rights to life and personal integrity of the victims as well as to prevent violence against women.” The human rights organization also said the country was not giving the loved ones of female victims justice or adequate protection.
“Unfortunately, no woman is immune to sexual harassment in our country, which is why we work daily to combat it,” the government’s women’s ministry, established by Sheinbaum last year, said in a statement on Tuesday. “The President’s closeness to the Mexican people cannot be interpreted as an opportunity to invade her personal space or to engage in any type of physical contact without her consent.”
The president also said she had no plans to change her style of greeting members of the public. “We have to be close to the people,” Sheinbaum said.
Update 11/6/2025 at 5:45 a.m. ET: This article was updated with additional information.
