In a follow up to her 2018 article for LSE USAPP, Caroline Beer writes that, in Mexico, while LGBTQ+ people have formal rights and legal protections, these are rarely enjoyed in any meaningful way. In Mexico, important legal advances for LGBTQ+ rights have been accompanied by an increasingly loud discourse of hate. This hate, combined with the weak rule of law means that LGBTQ+ people experience a high level of ongoing risk of persecution and violence.
In 2018, my research with Victor D. Cruz-Aceves on the recognition of same-sex relationships in the US and Mexico was featured on the USAPP blog. My article examines the legal framework for LGBTQ+ rights in Mexico and addresses the puzzling finding that many LGBTQ+ rights were extended earlier in Mexico than in the United States. This is surprising because the dominant theories of comparative politics would suggest that countries with a stronger LGBTQ+ movement, a less religious population, and longer control by left parties would have stronger protections for LGBTQ+ people. Compared to the US, Mexico’s LGBTQ+ movement is weaker, Mexico is more religious, and a conservative Catholic party governed for most of the early 2000s; nevertheless, Mexico enacted some progressive laws governing LGBTQ+ rights before the United States.
LGBTQ+ related laws in Mexico may be progressive, but the rule of law is weak
In the years since the article was published, I have become aware that this research has been used by lawyers from the United States Immigration and Customs Enforcement as evidence that LGBTQ+ people face no threats of violence in Mexico and therefore should not be protected by the US asylum system. This is a profound misreading of the research. The article does not examine violence against LGBTQ+ people. In fact, it states, “In many ways the rule of law has not been effectively implemented in Mexico, and agents of the state use violence in ways that are not authorized by the law. Individual state actors have used state violence against sexual minorities, often with impunity.”
Our 2018 article does not provide any evidence about the level of violence faced by LGBTQ+ people in Mexico and should not be used as evidence that LGBTQ+ people are safe from government repression and other violence including murder and torture. The article focuses on the legal framework in Mexico and not on the actual implementation of laws. Mexico has very progressive legislation in many areas, but the law in Mexico is rarely enforced in a fair or uniform way. Many rights exist formally but are rarely enjoyed in any meaningful way by everyday people, especially outside of Mexico City.
The rule of law in Mexico is very weak. Mexico ranks 116th out of 142 countries in the World Justice Project’s Rule of Law Index, scoring worse than El Salvador and Guatemala. One important factor of the rule of law related to violence against LGBTQ+ people is the effectiveness of the criminal justice system. According to the World Justice Project Index, Mexico ranks 132 out of 142 countries in terms of the effectiveness of its criminal justice system. The World Bank’s Rule of Law Estimate measures “the extent to which agents have confidence in and abide by the rules of society, and in particular the quality of contract enforcement, property rights, the police, and the courts, as well as the likelihood of crime and violence.” In 2023 Mexico scored -0.8 on this index that ranges from -2.5 to 2.5, placing it in the bottom quarter of the world’s countries. The United States Agency for International Development also highlights the weakness of Mexico’s rule of law, stating “Impunity – and the crime, violence and corruption that it enables – is Mexico’s principal governance challenge. With nearly 93 percent of crimes going unreported or uninvestigated, Mexico’s high level of impunity reduces economic growth and hinders citizen faith in government”.
Violence facing LGBTQ+ people in Mexico
While our 2018 article provides no evidence about the actual safety of LGBTQ+ people living in Mexico, there is considerable evidence about the types of violence faced by LGBTQ+ people in Mexico today. According the United States Department of State 2023 Report on Human Rights Practices in Mexico: “Significant human rights issues included credible reports of: […] crimes involving violence or threats of violence targeting lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer, or intersex persons”. The organization Transrespect documented 701 murders of trans people in Mexico from 2008 to 2023, placing Mexico second in the world (behind Brazil) for violence against trans people. LGBTQ+ people at the US-Mexico border suffer dangerous conditions when not allowed to enter the United States. Guidance from the United States Department of Homeland Security for Migrant Protection Protocols calls for LGBTQ+ people to be exempted from the processing requirements under MPP due to their “particular vulnerabilities” because they may face “increased risk of harm in Mexico due to their sexual orientation or gender identity”. Human Rights Watch has documented cases of Mexican police, immigration agents and National Guard soldiers extorting and beating LGBTQ+ asylum seekers.
“Marcha Del Orgullo LGBTTTI 2018 Ciudad d” (CC BY-SA 2.0) by Protoplasma K
From 2018 to 2022, at least 453 LGBTQ+ people were murdered in Mexico. There were 87 documented murders of LGBTQ+ people in 2022 and 66 in 2023. These numbers come from media reports of violence. Many cases (especially in poor and rural areas) may not be covered in the media, so the actual number of murders is almost certainly higher than the number of documented cases presented here. Of the 87 murders in 2022, half of the victims’ bodies were publicly displayed suggesting the murders were committed to send some type of public message. Transwomen are at especially high risk of violence. More than half of the murders of LGBTQ+ people catalogued by the human rights organization Letra S were transwomen. The National Observatory of Hate Crimes Against LGBTI+ in Mexico documented 47 murders and disappearances of LGBTI+ people in 2023.
In Mexico important legal advances for LGBTQ+ rights have been accompanied by an increasingly loud discourse of hate. As LGBTQ+ people became more visible, they were more likely to suffer violence. According a 2022 report by the Mexican National Commission for Human Rights “In Mexico, six of every ten people in the LGBTQ+ community has suffered some type of discrimination, and more than half report having suffered expressions of hate, physical aggressions and assault.”
LGBTQ+ activists and public officials have suffered especially high rates of violence. In Aguascalientes in 2023 Ociel Baena, a federal electoral judge and the first non-binary person to occupy a public office in Mexico, was murdered. Also in 2023 in Aguascalientes Ulises Nava, an LGBTQ+ human rights advocate and head of the Department of Sexual Diversity at the Autonomous University of Guerrero was murdered as he was leaving an LGBTQ+ rights conference.
During the first two weeks of 2024, four LGBTQ+ activists were murdered or violently attacked. Samantha Fonseca, a trans human rights activist and Senate candidate, was shot and killed in Mexico City just after announcing a protest for trans rights. Another LGBTQ+ human rights activist and member of the municipal council in Jacona, Michoacán, Miriam Ríos Ríos, was killed in January of 2024. Also, in January 2024 in Coacalco, Estado de México, the activist Nicté Chávez was violently attacked while the perpetrator yelled transphobic insults. And Paola Suárez was hospitalized after a violent attack in Guanajuato. In February 2024 Miguel Ángel Zavala, a doctor and a candidate for the mayor of Maravatío, Michoacán, was murdered . During the first five months of 2024, Letra S documented the deaths of 31 LGBTQ+ people.
In Mexico, LGBTQ+ people have suffered horrific violence over the past few years. The Mexican government has done very little to protect them. LGBTQ+ people in Mexico have a well-founded fear of persecution (including a well-founded fear of torture and death) in their home country based on their membership in a marginalized social group.
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