Claudia Sheinbaum becomes Mexico's first female president

Claudia Sheinbaum, a climate scientist who moved from academia to the difficult world of politics, took office Tuesday as Mexico's first female president.

Her inauguration breaks a political glass ceiling in a country with a long tradition of machismo, where women were only given the right to vote in 1953.

“Women have been left out for a long time,” Sheinbaum said after taking the oath of office at a ceremony in Mexico City. “As children, we were told a version of the story in which the protagonists were men…Now we know that presidents can be women.”

The crowd broke into chants: “President!”

Claudia Sheinbaum succeeds Andrés Manuel López Obrador as Mexican president.

(Fernando Llano/Associated Press)

Sheinbaum, 62, takes power at a tumultuous time worldwide and in Mexico, where she must grapple with the perennial issues of violence and migration as well as the enormous expectations of her hugely popular predecessor, Andrés Manuel López Obrador.

She donned the presidential sash – embroidered with the Mexican tricolor and embossed with the national coat of arms interspersed with gold thread – at the San Lázaro Palace, the seat of the Mexican Congress.

The ceremony was delayed as both Sheinbaum's car and the car carrying López Obrador to Congress were mobbed by well-wishers lining the streets. News crews on motorcycles pursued both cars between buildings decorated with banners bearing Sheinbaum's image.

President Claudia Sheinbaum speaks in Congress after taking the oath of office in Mexico City, Tuesday, Oct. 1, 2024.

(Eduardo Verdugo/Associated Press)

Scattered groups of demonstrators gathered to protest against López Obrador's controversial judicial reform, which Sheinbaum has supported. But the number of celebrants was significantly outnumbered by the groups.

“I came here very early because I wanted to feel the emotions of a woman receiving the presidential sash, something I never thought I would experience again,” said Karina Gutiérrez, 42, an accountant. “I'm really emotional. I want to cry. We finally have a female president in a nation that has always been dominated by men. It’s a historic day.”

Sheinbaum's ascension to Mexico's highest office comes at a time when women have made significant progress throughout the country's political system, thanks in part to a law that requires political parties to ensure that women vote in federal, state and local elections at least 50% of all candidates are female candidates.

Today, more than half of congressmen and nearly a third of governors are women, as are the heads of the Supreme Court and the Central Bank.

At her inauguration, Sheinbaum described her victory as a victory for all women, “for those who fought for and achieved their dreams, and for those who did not achieve them, for those who had to remain silent and scream alone, for those who have not achieved them.” Indigenous women, the domestic workers who leave their villages to support us, to the great-grandmothers who didn't learn to read and write because it wasn't for girls, to the mothers who gave us life first and then everything else, the sisters, the aunts, the beautiful daughters.”

“I’m not alone,” she said. “We’ve all arrived.”

Sheinbaum, a leftist who has vowed to tackle Mexico's problems pragmatically and prioritize the country's working class, won a landslide victory in the nationwide vote on June 2. She will be Mexico's 66th president since independence from Spain in 1821 and will serve a single six-year term, as required by Mexican law.

Sheinbaum, the granddaughter of immigrants from Eastern Europe, will also be the first person of Jewish descent to serve as president of a predominantly Roman Catholic nation.

She is a close ally of López Obrador, who brought her from academia to be his environment secretary in 2000, when he was mayor of Mexico City.

Sheinbaum was subsequently elected mayor of the capital district of Tlalpan, and in 2018 – the same year López Obrador assumed the presidency – she became mayor of Mexico City.

Tuesday's ceremonial transfer of power was attended by heads of state from around the world, including the left-wing leaders of Brazil, Colombia, Chile and Guatemala. First Lady Jill Biden attended, as did California Governor Gavin Newsom.

US First Lady Jill Biden arrives with US Ambassador Ken Salazar at the American Embassy in Mexico City on Monday, a day before Claudia Sheinbaum's inauguration. Before the ceremony, Salazar told reporters: “It's a historic day for the world.”

(Fernando Llano/Associated Press)

Sheinbaum ran under the banner of the ruling National Regeneration Movement, known as Morena, a party registered by López Obrador just a decade ago that quickly became the country's dominant political force.

The party has a de facto supermajority in the Mexican Congress and in governorships in 24 of 32 Mexican states.

Sheinbaum has vowed to continue the sweeping “transformation” of Mexican society promised by her predecessor, who significantly expanded welfare benefits for students and the elderly, increased the military's power and pushed for a series of controversial constitutional reforms. Among them is an incendiary plan to elect federal judges that has sparked nationwide protests.

Among the challenges the new president will face is perhaps none greater than the increasing power of organized crime, which controls much of the country and has expanded from cross-border drug trafficking to extortion, kidnapping and other schemes.

Some observers worry that López Obrador's heavy spending on social programs and huge infrastructure projects such as a 1,600-mile train through the Yucatan jungle could put her government in dire economic straits. But Mexico benefits from its proximity to the United States and the presence of manufacturers focused on exports to its northern neighbor.

Sheinbaum will also have to deal with the ongoing challenge of illegal immigration as Mexico has become a major transit point for migrants from around the world to the United States.

Although López Obrador is often critical of U.S. policies, he worked closely with Washington and the Biden and Trump administrations to crack down on illegal migration, using police and soldiers to turn back migrants from the U.S.-Mexico border. Sheinbaum is widely expected to continue this collaboration in a US election year in which immigration has become a dominant campaign issue.

President Andrés Manuel López Obrador waves during his final morning news conference at the National Palace in Mexico City on Monday.

(Fernando Llano/Associated Press)

Facing her presidency is the 70-year-old López Obrador, who has vowed to retreat to his family ranch in the southern state of Chiapas and stay out of the political strife that has consumed his adult life. He leaves office with an approval rating of over 70% – much of it coming from poor and working-class Mexicans who have seen increases in the minimum wage, pensions and welfare payments under his leadership. But the country is deeply divided over his often polarizing statements and style.

Sheinbaum is widely seen as a pragmatist who lacks some of the political instincts of her populist predecessor. She says her science background will serve her well when tackling issues like energy that have caused controversy here. López Obrador has focused on revitalizing the moribund state oil giant Pemex while investing little in alternative energy sources.

“I've always said that as a scientist you always have to ask why and look for solutions,” Sheinbaum said in an interview with the Los Angeles Times last year. “And something similar happens in politics.”

Claudia Sheinbaum, second from right, poses for a photo after being confirmed as the winner of the presidential election during a ceremony at the Federal Electoral Court in Mexico City on August 15.

(Fernando Llano/Associated Press)

As one of three siblings, Sheinbaum comes from Mexico City. Her late father was a businessman and chemical engineer, her mother is a biologist and prominent academic.

Her parents were active in the 1968 student movement, best known for the infamous Tlatelolco massacre, in which Mexican security forces killed scores of protesters in the capital.

As a high school student, Sheinbaum took part in protests against the exclusion of students, many of whom were poor, from higher education. While studying at the Autonomous University of Mexico (UNAM), she was part of a movement against a plan to increase the public institution's fees.

She studied physics there and later completed her doctorate for four years at the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory in California.

President Claudia Sheinbaum waves to her supporters in the Zócalo, Mexico City's main square, as indigenous women stand behind her.

(Fernando Llano/Associated Press)

Last year, Sheinbaum married Jesús María Tarriba, a physicist who works in the private banking sector. She has a daughter and a stepson from a previous marriage.

At her inauguration, Sheinbaum said one of her first acts as president would be traveling to Acapulco on Wednesday to survey damage from Hurricane John, which killed at least 17 people and devastated several towns along Mexico's Pacific coast.

In the afternoon, she spoke to thousands gathered in the Zócalo, Mexico City's central square, and outlined 100 policy points – including plans for the economy, security and infrastructure projects.

Indigenous representatives presented her with a ceremonial ceremony decorated with ribbons Baston de Mando – a staff that symbolizes political and spiritual leadership. As the new president spoke, indigenous women stood behind her, holding corn stalks. Smoke from burning incense, used for purification in some indigenous rituals, wafted over the lectern.

Sheinbaum promised to lead Mexico on “the path of peace, security, democracy, environmental protection, freedom and justice.”

Special correspondent Cecilia Sanchez Vidal contributed to this report.