Omar García Harfuch and the relaunch of security as a priority for the Mexican State: From moral discourse to institutional effectiveness

The first year of Claudia Sheinbaum’s government marks a turning point in public security and national security policy: Mexico is transitioning from rhetoric to results, from ideology to intelligence.

The appearance of Security Secretary Omar García Harfuch before the Senate of the Republic was not just an exercise in accountability, but an act of political affirmation: the Mexican State is recovering its capacity to govern the territory and control violence. For some, the speech marked a silent break with the recent past; for others, it is something closer to change without rupture. Where there were once moral promises, today data, results, and structures are presented to demonstrate that security, for the first time in a long while, is explained through effectiveness.

Toward the Second floor of the Transformation in security matters: The state recovers ground

In the analysis of Secretary García Harfuch’s speech during his appearance before the Senate, it is clear that his political intention is to show that Mexico is entering a new stage of the Fourth Transformation: one where security is no longer defined by narrative, but by the State’s capacity to produce measurable and sustainable results.

Beyond the numbers—which were many and compelling—the political message was another: the institutional reconstruction of public security as the backbone of Claudia Sheinbaum’s government. That is why what we heard was not a simple speech to applaud achievements, but a roadmap toward a more ambitious project: a modern, technologized, and intelligence-based State Security, which will have costs in terms of both resources and a new social pact regarding citizens’ freedoms.

From this argument arise the recent constitutional and legal reforms in security matters that have been legislated in the last year, subject to criticism from various actors who have considered them contrary to citizens’ freedoms and the progressivity of human rights.

During the past six years, security in Mexico was explained through a moral narrative: «the good against the corrupt,» «hugs instead of bullets.» That narrative had its historical moment to help implement a new regime, but it also had its limits.

Today, under Claudia Sheinbaum’s administration, the strategy seems to have shifted to different ground: institutional efficiency, federal-territorial coordination, and police professionalization to provide support for the second stage of the Fourth Transformation (4T) political project, of which President Sheinbaum is a part, moreover as its first president emerging from that political movement without origins in the old regime.

In a Senate with an official majority and a testimonial opposition, Secretary Harfuch presented figures that speak of a country that, despite its wounds, is beginning to recover operational capacity and institutional trust. The 46% decrease in crime-related homicides compared to 2018, the dismantling of more than 1,500 methamphetamine laboratories, and the capture of more than 35,000 violence generators are data that by themselves send an unequivocal message: the State is returning to exercise control over the territory.

But it is not just about numbers; it is about a reconstruction of the Mexican State from its most sensitive architecture: security.

The new map of security in Mexico

The states and regions mentioned in the speech—Guanajuato, Jalisco, Nuevo León, Guerrero, Tabasco, Tamaulipas, and the northern border—were not chosen at random. They are, at the same time, the country’s industrial nodes and the main corridors of organized crime.

The message is clear: security and economic development are no longer separate issues. In a context of nearshoring, energy investment, and industrial relocation, the federal government’s priority is to protect critical infrastructure and supply chains, especially in the center and north of the country.

The deployment of 10,000 National Guard elements in seven border entities and the record seizures of cocaine, weapons, and fentanyl not only reflect operational efficiency: they reaffirm the political will to build, from the Mexican side of the border, a wall of sovereignty based on intelligence and actions with strategic impact, not just rhetoric, especially in a context of enormous pressure from the United States under the Trump administration.

Cooperate without subordinating

An aspect little commented on, but of enormous strategic relevance, is the new relationship with the United States. The transfer of 55 high-profile criminals to U.S. prisons is a calculated gesture: it shows willingness to cooperate, but also sovereign decision-making capacity, albeit aware of the existing asymmetrical relationship.

Harfuch has achieved what few officials in recent administrations have: being a reliable interlocutor for Washington without renouncing the nationalist narrative that characterizes the 4T. That skill, forged in his career as a police officer and as a politician, makes him today one of the most influential actors with the greatest projection toward 2030.

Peace as a public good of the State

Perhaps the most important message of the speech was not said with words, but with structure: every achievement, every figure, every operation was presented as a result of inter-institutional coordination between the Army, Air Force, Navy, National Guard, and state governments.

That way of presenting the results conveys a central idea: security does not depend on one person, but on a system. A system that, with its imperfections, is beginning to function with its own logic.

The concept of lasting peace appears not as an ethical promise, but as a measurable institutional goal: criminal intelligence, territorial presence, and verifiable reduction of crimes.

In summary, it is about governing the territory again from the State’s public policy, and not from reaction or improvisation.

A new political cycle

President Sheinbaum knows that security will be the thermometer of her six-year term. In view of the 2027 midterm election that will renew the Chamber of Deputies and the eventual mandate revocation referendum, advances in this area could define the political direction of her government and the legacy of which she is a part.

That is why Harfuch’s speech before the Senate, more than a simple appearance, should also be read as an internal political message: the security cabinet has direction, method, and results. In an administration that seeks to consolidate its own stamp within the Fourth Transformation, security has become the bridge between political legitimacy and technical effectiveness.

Mexico seems to be leaving behind the stage of narratives to enter that of results; therefore, the challenge now will be to sustain those results over time, ensuring they do not depend on names or circumstances, but on solid, reliable, and permanent institutions.

Security is not a goal: it is a continuous process of learning and adaptation, and perhaps for the first time in a long while, the Mexican State is beginning to show that it has learned to learn.

Harfuch’s speech was not the closure of a cycle, but the beginning of a new one: that of a country that, with all its contradictions, is once again believing that it can govern its destiny through intelligence, law, coordination, and cooperation.