MEXICO CITY — President Claudia Sheinbaum’s approval rating dipped to the lowest level of her term in March, as Mexicans expressed deepening worries about corruption and crime following the killing of a notorious cartel leader.

Roughly 54% of the poll’s respondents approved of Sheinbaum, down 2 points from February and 9 from her January rating, according to LatAm Pulse, a survey conducted by AtlasIntel for Bloomberg News and published Thursday. Disapproval rose to 41%, up 5 points from a month ago and 10 from the start of the year, the poll found.

Sheinbaum is also struggling to push a proposed overhaul of Mexico’s electoral system through congress, an idea that splits respondents.

Mexico’s president remains one of Latin America’s most well-regarded leaders, and her slide coincides with falling popularity for both conservative and leftist peers across the region. Brazil’s Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva and Argentina’s Javier Milei also saw downturns this month, according to LatAm Pulse. In Chile, new President Jose Antonio Kast is facing backlash from voters over his decision to hike fuel prices.

A spokesperson for Sheinbaum didn’t respond to a request for comment on the decline, which occurred against the backdrop of mounting worries about corruption and violence. More than half of Mexicans rated corruption as a top concern, while 49% flagged insecurity, a 10-point rise from the month prior.

The surge came despite the killing of Nemesio Oseguera Cervantes, the leader of the Jalisco New Generation Cartel known as “El Mencho,” in a federal operation at the end of February.

Mexicans overwhelmingly supported the operation, with 78% saying they approved of the government’s actions. But nearly two-thirds said they were worried or extremely worried about violence that erupted after his death. They were largely split on Sheinbaum’s handling of violence overall, with 38% saying she’s done well against 32% who rate her poorly.

Security Minister Omar Garcia Harfuch, the face of the government’s crime-fighting efforts, fares significantly better, earning positive marks from 45% of respondents against 16% who say he’s doing a poor job.

The poll found substantial support for additional military operations against organized crime, with 42% saying they were the best way to target cartels and another 34% seeing them as effective when paired with other policies. Roughly 82% backed more cooperation between the U.S. and Mexico to combat cartels through intelligence sharing, but a majority said they would oppose U.S. military action in Mexican territory under any circumstance.

Corruption concerns, meanwhile, have lingered at a time when members of Sheinbaum’s ruling Morena party have been involved in a series of scandals. A mayor from the party was recently arrested on accusations that he’d extorted businesses, including prominent multinational corporations.

Morena officials have also faced allegations of links to a fuel smuggling scandal known locally as “huachicol fiscal,” although they have denied wrongdoing and Sheinbaum has moved to aggressively combat the practice.

Nearly half of Mexicans rated their economy as poor in March, amid slow growth and accelerating inflation that has fed expectations among some economists that the central bank will hold interest rates steady later Thursday. But they’re more optimistic about the future than counterparts in countries like Brazil, with 40% saying they expect the economy to improve over the next six months against 29% who see it worsening.

Electoral Reform

Sheinbaum suffered another setback early Thursday morning, when the Senate approved a revised version of her priority election reform but stripped out a proposal to hold a presidential recall vote alongside next year’s midterm and judicial elections. The amended reform proposal now moves to the lower house for its consideration.

Critics of moving up the recall vote argued that combining the elections would’ve given Morena an unfair advantage by putting the still popular Sheinbaum on the ballot along with lower house lawmakers, judges and state-level candidates.

“The parties were probably afraid that if the president is on the ballot, some parties will get more votes than others,” Sheinbaum said during her daily press briefing Thursday. “They’re wrong. A recall election is one thing, and the vote for the lower house is another.”

Lawmakers had already defeated Sheinbaum’s initial plan to overhaul the electoral system. According to the LatAm Pulse survey, the reform drive divides Mexicans, with 43% in favor but 42% opposed.

AtlasIntel surveyed 3,263 people in Mexico on March 20-24. The poll has a confidence level of 95% and a margin of error of plus or minus 2 percentage points.

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—With assistance from Alex Vasquez.

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