By Juan Larrosa, September 7, 2026<\/p>\n
Last week, President Claudia Sheinbaum devoted several days to presenting her second government report. How can we understand this report from a communication perspective? Although it may sound obvious, the report seeks to account for the state of the country after a year of work: what was done, what is still in progress, what was left undone, and what challenges remain. As we know, governments\u2014not only the Mexican government\u2014tend to focus on the positive, and it is rare to see any sign of self-criticism. For that reason, the report is perhaps useful as a way of observing the government\u2019s priorities and the areas in which it is making progress or, at least, where it believes it is making progress.<\/p>\n
For the same reason, and from the opposite perspective, it is also significant to identify what is not mentioned even though it is of public importance. This can help us gauge what is going wrong. Sheinbaum did not mention the disappeared or the collectives devoted to searching for them; she did not speak about extortion or impunity; she did not discuss the conditions of migration in the country, especially along the southern border; and she avoided addressing violence against journalists and media organizations in a year in which the killings of media workers have not stopped. She barely mentioned the USMCA and the complicated relationship with Donald Trump. The list is telling.<\/p>\n
At another level, we can also ask who the report is addressed to. In 2007, a president attended Congress for the last time to present his government report. On that occasion, Felipe Calder\u00f3n was unable to fully carry out the task because the opposition, much of which is now in government, made it difficult for the political ceremony to take place. Then, in 2008, the Constitution was amended to eliminate the president\u2019s obligation to personally attend Congress, while retaining the obligation to submit the report in writing. This retreat speaks to the polarization the country has experienced and to how difficult a genuine process of accountability has become.<\/p>\n
So, returning to the question, the report is no longer part of a republican and institutional act and has instead become an exercise that makes life easier for both the presidency and the opposition. For the presidency, it is easy because, as in this case, its interlocutors are its allies: the federal cabinet, the new judiciary, the presidents of both chambers of Congress, who belong to parties aligned with the government, governors from the governing majority, and businesspeople, union leaders, intellectuals, and artists who also sympathize with the president. It is easy applause. But it is also easy for the opposition because, first, they use the occasion to speak about the government\u2019s authoritarianism and closed-mindedness when, as we can see, this is a practice that dates back many years. More importantly, it allows them to avoid conducting a serious, critical, and republican evaluation of the government\u2019s work and to distance themselves from the shouting and theatrics that led to the cancellation of this political ritual in Mexico.<\/p>\n
As a communication practice, then, the presidential report has become selective, closed, and devoid of genuine dialogue, closer to an act of propaganda than to one of accountability. This generation of politicians will not be the one to recover the republican character of the occasion.<\/p>\n
This text was originally broadcast on NTR Radio News on September 7, 2026, hosted by journalist Sonia Serrano.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"