President Claudia Sheinbaum has found a forceful way to defend Mexican nationals in America: send lawyers, demand criminal investigations, threaten detention contractors, and call in the United Nations.
Foreign Secretary Roberto Velasco announced complaints over 17 deaths linked to ICE custody or enforcement, including 14 inside detention centers. From USA Today:
Mexico has begun filing criminal complaints with state prosecutors in the United States over the deaths of its citizens in U.S. immigration custody and during enforcement operations, the foreign ministry said on Tuesday.
Mexico's government has also sent cease-and-desist letters to U.S. detention centers where Mexican nationals have died, the ministry added in a statement.
The filings follow the deaths of at least 14 Mexican nationals in ICE custody and several others during arrest operations, including the recent fatal shooting of a Mexican citizen by an ICE agent in Houston.
President Claudia Sheinbaum announced Mexico's intention to escalate its response to the deaths last Friday, as she claimed that the government "cannot turn a blind eye to the Mexicans who have died."
In addition to the measures in the U.S., Mexico's foreign minister also contacted the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights regarding the deaths of Mexican nationals in ICE custody.
Mexico expects the U.N. office to gather information from U.S. authorities, analyze the events and "refer the case to the relevant special procedures of the Human Rights Council," the statement added.
Mexico also sent cease-and-desist letters over alleged failures involving medical care.
The legal action doesn't seek a blanket halt to deportations. It targets deaths and detention practices, and U.S. authorities have no legal duty to act on Mexico's request.
Mexico does accept deportees. Its México te Abraza program recorded 189,830 repatriations from Jan. 20, 2025, through March 18, 2026. Sheinbaum is accepting returning citizens while staging a louder public fight whenever an ICE case can be presented as an insult to Mexico.
The spectacle leaves a larger question hanging. If Sheinbaum feels such urgency after Mexican nationals encounter ICE, where was the same urgency when they concluded that life north of the border offered more safety, work, or hope than home?
What really digs a burr deep into my saddle is how easily and quickly everybody turns the tears on for those poor souls who:
- Illegally enter our country
- Commit serious felonies, including murder
- Get rounded up by ICE for breaking laws mentioned in 1 and 2
- Occasionally, during their apprehension, do something insanely stupid, listen to people who recommend fighting the feds, and get themselves killed by resisting lawful arrest.
Anybody's death is tragic; there's no denying that. 17 people, according to Sheinbaum, died in ICE custody. But what the left seemingly “forgets” are those killed by those same illegal immigrants.
I wanted to find out how many Americans were killed by illegals, so I asked ChatGPT, “Give me an estimate of how many Americans have been killed by illegal immigrants in the past five years.”
Federal authorities don’t maintain an exact count, but available Texas crime rates suggest illegal immigrants may have killed roughly 1,000 to 2,000 American citizens during the last five calendar years, with about 1,500 as a reasonable midpoint.
I realized afterward that I asked the wrong question. Breitbart's Neil Munro summarized it much better:
Mexico’s intervention in the U.S. immigration system comes after decades in which the huge population of Mexicans in the United States has killed hundreds of thousands of Americans via drug trafficking, drunk driving, murder, and other crimes. In January, for example, Mexican national Kenneth Moreno Guzman was arrested by police in Georgia for allegedly raping an 11-year-old girl.
In 2025, roughly 70,000 Americans were killed by drug overdoses, mostly due to drugs smuggled from Mexico. Many others were crippled by the drugs, often while being ignored by local governments that are eager to welcome illegal migrants.
Roughly 37 million Hispanics of Mexican origin lived in the United States in 2021, according to a 2023 study by Pew Research Center. That vast population was quietly welcomed by the U.S. establishment because it spikes consumer sales, pushes up real estate prices, and forces down Americans’ wages.
The movement of Mexicans into the United States is also extremely profitable to Mexico. The migration northwards reduces pressure on the government to create jobs and fund welfare programs, and it also causes a huge flow of remittances back into Mexico. In 2025, the Mexican economy was boosted by $62 billion in remittances from the United States.
Yet the Mexican government is justifying the intervention following the death of 17 Mexican illegal migrants in U.S custody, according to Reuters.
The Mexican escalation comes after President Donald Trump stopped illegal migration and reduced drug inflows, pressured Mexico to suppress its drug cartels, and stopped plans to extend the U.S.-Canada free trade policy.
Mexico received $62.5 billion in remittances during 2025. People migrate for economic opportunity, family, and safety, then send money home to relatives.
In practice, the case cushions Mexico from the consequences of weak opportunity and insecurity; its people leave, work abroad, and support communities back home while Washington inherits the enforcement battle.
Sheinbaum can point to real improvement in homicide numbers. Preliminary 2025 data showed a sharp decline, but organized crime remains entrenched, and official records counted 33,241 homicide deaths in 2024.
Protecting Mexicans abroad is a proper consular duty; protecting them well enough at home that departure no longer looks like the best option is the harder test.
And yet, nothing Sheinbaum or other Mexican officials can say or do will make families avoid suffering.
This was someone's little girl... someone's little boy.
— Andrew Zywiec, M.D. (@AndrewZywiecMD) July 13, 2026
These people were once young and innocent.
Every single day I am more saddened by our world.
pic.twitter.com/gn15yNVOpq
Mexico's next presidential election is due in 2030. Its Constitution limits presidents to one six-year term, so Sheinbaum can't run again. The performance can still help her Morena movement by casting Mexico as the injured party, redirecting blame toward the United States, and turning immigration enforcement into a nationalist grievance.
President Donald Trump shouldn't dismiss legitimate questions about deaths in custody, but he shouldn't let Mexico blur the boundary between demanding humane treatment and obstructing lawful removal.
The United States decides who may remain here; Mexico should be ready to receive its people, including criminals who have no legal right to stay.
Sheinbaum wants Mexico's people protected.
Bless her heart.
Protection begins long before an ICE arrest, before a courtroom fight, and before a worker decides the only future worth chasing lies across the Rio Grande.
Sending lawyers north is easy; building a country people want to come back to needs work that her latest performance carefully avoids.
Mexico can send lawyers north, but it can’t sue away the failures that pushed so many of its people across the border. PJ Media VIP keeps digging past the performance and into the facts. Join today and save 60% with promo code FIGHT.
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