MEXICO CITY – The National Observatory of Hate Crimes Against LGBT+ People recorded 97 murders of members of the community this year, with indications of prejudice or hate-motivated killings. The majority of these victims were trans women, with 57 cases, followed by 30 gay men, three lesbian women, and also crimes against trans men, bisexual men, and non-binary people.
Almost eight murders a month
“We’re not talking about numbers, but about lives erased through torture, mutilation, the display of bodies, and hate speech. These are not isolated incidents; they are acts of violence that seek not only to kill, but to erase identities and send a brutal message of intolerance. It is structural, normalized, and unpunished violence. These are the consequences of institutional perspectives accumulated over time. But today is different. Our movement was born to address the root causes of inequality, exclusion, and the structural violence we inherited, placing human dignity at the center,” stated Senator Karina Isabel Ruiz Ruiz at the presentation of the report “Our Lives Count” at the Senate of the Republic on November 3rd.
She joins experts and civil society organizations in demanding robust official records, investigations with a diversity perspective, implemented protocols, trained public prosecutors, attorneys general, police officers, and forensic experts, genuine inter-institutional coordination, and clear pathways for prevention, support, and punishment. “Mexican humanism compels us to act because diversity is richness, inclusion is justice, and human dignity is non-negotiable,” she declared.
The Observatory’s Work
Gloria Careaga, general coordinator of the Arcoíris Foundation, explains that the creation of the Observatory of Crimes against LGBT+ People in 2018 was a watershed moment: “We participated in the evaluation of the Mexican government regarding the human rights situation in our country, we submitted the parallel report to the United Nations Human Rights Council, and we carried out very important advocacy work with various embassies in both Latin America and Europe. Fortunately, as a result of that work, we managed to get seven governments to make recommendations to our country, and among them was precisely the protection of LGBT+ people,” she recounts.
She adds that the recommendations have been followed up through the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and, primarily, with the Attorney General’s Office. From there, the Arcoíris Foundation developed the investigation protocol on crimes against the LGBT+ community, which was approved this year by the Conference of Governments.
Currently, they have been approaching INEGI (the National Institute of Statistics and Geography) to request that sexual orientation and gender identity be added to the categories of analysis used in the law’s research. “We want to be part of the National Government Plan and for the data we contribute to support the public policies we need so that there are truly decisive government actions to improve the lives of LGBT+ people,” Careaga stated.
Rise in Homophobic and Transphobic Violence Parallel to Fascism
Camilo Vicente Ovalle, a historian specializing in political violence and forced disappearances in Mexico, commented that the report reminds us that hate crimes do not emerge from nowhere, nor do they unfold in a vacuum. On the contrary, they are woven from both long-standing and current events. The figures and stories of violence presented in the report place, for example, the year 2024 in an international scenario where the advancement of rights coexists with resistance against a global conservative-fascist counteroffensive.
“The report shows how these factors converge in a polarized context where anti-LGBT rhetoric is transformed into a tool for political mobilization that creates conditions for symbolic and physical violence. And in the case of the United States and elsewhere, these phenomena find fertile ground cultivated by structural inequalities such as patriarchy, religious moralism, and organized violence in certain territories,” Ovalle stated.
In Mexico, at the institutional level, despite key advances such as the ban on conversion therapies in the country, the criminalization of hate crimes, and the criminalization of femicide in Mexico City and Nayarit, the report highlights and demonstrates the lack of harmonized regulations at the national level, the absence of official records disaggregated by sexual orientation and gender identity, the lack of mandatory protocols with an LGBT+ focus, deficiencies in mental health and suicide prevention policies, and serious omissions by prosecutors’ offices and human rights commissions.
“Historically, these elements have been and continue to be drivers of violence. Institutions not only fail to prevent it, but they also perpetuate prejudices. The report documents cases where authorities classify murders as crimes of passion without investigating, where disappearances are registered without respecting the gender identity law, and where social families, which are fundamental to our LGBT+ communities, are ignored by the State,” the expert warned.
The report highlights that attacks against LGBT+ people not only occur in the civilian sphere, but in many cases are reinforced by patterns of police and institutional violence, as well as the actions of organized groups. Particularly in the case of trans women, attacks have been preceded and accompanied by police harassment, arbitrary arrests, and extortion, reflecting that security forces can become direct aggressors rather than protectors.
Furthermore, in its analysis of hate crimes, the report adds the complexity of the geographical context: the states with the highest incidence—Mexico City, Veracruz, Jalisco, Morelos, Michoacán, and Guanajuato—show that hate violence is not a local phenomenon, but a national one. However, each region has its own specific factors, such as organized crime, normalized misogynistic and transphobic violence, social inequality, the presence of conservative religious groups, and institutional weaknesses. Ovalle highlights a strong need for differentiated policies that take into account territorial factors: “There can be no justice when the right to life depends on each penal code according to the state and local conditions. A national classification of hate crimes based on sexual orientation, gender identity, and gender expression is fundamental.”
Protection for Human Rights Defenders
Kenlly Pacheco, coordinator of the Observatory, highlighted that 12 of the crimes committed against LGBT+ people in 2024 involved human rights defenders from the community. Since 2019, 46 LGBT+ human rights defenders have been murdered.
“We found some cross-cutting findings, and one of them relates to systematic violence: these are not isolated cases; patterns have been identified in each of the areas, and so we need to focus on reviewing what to do to prevent this from happening. Institutions lack specific protocols or differentiated approaches, and there is no training for public servants. Civil society organizations are the ones sustaining this work of documentation and support, in many cases doing the work that corresponds to the State. We are not just talking about numbers; we are talking about lives, identities, families, and projects that have been cut short. What we are presenting today seeks to transform pain into demands and public policies. The data we are presenting today should not paralyze us; on the contrary, it should mobilize us. Each number represents a life that should not have been lost, a family that deserves truth and justice,” Pacheco concluded.
Original article by Laura Buconi at Pie de Página, December 6th, 2025.
Translated by Schools for Chiapas.