The romance of the great flagship project of Mexico’s first female president, Claudia Sheinbaum, lasted just over a year when she announced the creation of the Secretariat for Women, a ministry that would have the same level and importance as the other government secretariats. This Thursday, after months of a rumor that seemed to have dissipated, Sheinbaum confirmed that Citlalli Hernández Mora, the young and experienced Morena militant, had resigned from the leadership of the Secretariat for Women to go “help” the party in the 2027 midterm elections. “Yesterday Citlali handed me her resignation, she told me she is going to the party, that she wants to help Morena,” she said.
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The president said the decision took her by surprise, but in the corridors and close circles around Hernández, her replacement had been rumored for months. In an interview with this newspaper last February, the secretary responded to the speculations by assuring that leaving the leadership of the Secretariat for Women would be “very irresponsible” on her part. “The creation of the first Secretariat for Women has been the greatest honor I have had to serve. For me, there is no more important task at this moment than attending to it. There is that rumor, I am a political militant; however, at this moment my way of helping the president, of serving my country and the commitment I feel to get the secretariat running, for me is unmovable,” she replied.
Things changed very quickly. In a complete turn, just over a month after these statements and almost a year and a half after working at the head of the department, Hernández said this Thursday that she thought about it a lot after receiving the invitation from Luisa María Alcalde, the national leader of Morena, who has already officially appointed her as president of the National Elections Commission. Hernández said the decision “had not been easy” and that she was willing to contribute to the unity of her party.
The creation of the Secretariat for Women as a department with a cabinet-level rank in the Federal Government replaced in 2024 the National Institute for Women (Inmujeres), created in 2001 during Vicente Fox’s presidency (2000-2006). Sheinbaum’s decision was a very important declaration of intent about what her future administration projected, as well as the priorities of her government.
However, the start of the department was plagued with criticism from feminist organizations due to constant budget cuts in gender equality matters amid impunity prevailing in the country in the fight against gender-based violence. At that time, Hernández said that among her priorities were the creation of a national care system, the distribution across the territory of a booklet of women’s rights, and the fight to combat and prevent gender violence.
The budget with which the secretariat was born was not very celebrated either. It started with about 2 billion pesos (97 million dollars) with injections to its budget that have currently left most of its financial resources focused on the flagship project of that department, the LIBRE centers. Although the government boasts having granted a historic budget of 983.4 million pesos in 2026, an increase of 48.6% compared to 2025, the management of its resources and new operating rules and agreement signings have made everything but clear when it comes to executing and applying the money in sustainable public policies.
The National Network of Shelters (RNR), for example, which since 2024 has accompanied more than 39,000 women, girls, and boys survivors of gender-based violence, denounces that during these years political decisions have been made that have not put women’s human rights at the center and that the first budget with which the Secretariat for Women was born eliminated, as such, the shelter program [it ceased to be autonomous and was merged into a larger one], an achievement that, they say, had been obtained in the previous administration.
“The creation of the Secretariat for Women was presented as an important advance, but today we see that it is not enough to create new structures if there are no conditions of continuity, clarity in attributions, solid operating mechanisms, and above all sustained political will. The secretary’s resignation is not an isolated event,” says Wendy Figueroa, a member of the Network.
The organization has been raising its voice for weeks and denouncing a lack of definition and constant changes that have generated concern. “That uncertainty has direct consequences on women’s lives,” says Figueroa. Hernández’s departure also leaves deep concern among several activists and particular cases that the Secretariat publicly accompanied, and also personally, in irregular legal processes. Such as the case of the 50-year prison sentence of Guadalupe Martínez, the Otomí woman accused of several crimes that, in the trial, were questioned due to inconsistencies and illegalities.
Secretary Hernández had spoken in favor of reviewing some of the judicial decisions that had led Martínez to receive that sentence. The case was reviewed, and on April 2, the woman’s defense reported that her appeal had not proceeded and that a judge from the State of Mexico had ordered the procedure to be redone, that is, a new trial for Martínez. Martínez’s family and lawyers said the decision seemed determined to exhaust them economically, psychologically, and emotionally.
Activist Carmen Sánchez, a symbol of acid violence against women in Mexico, who has accompanied Martínez during her case, sees Hernández’s departure not only as an administrative replacement but as a political message: “When an official who publicly assumed commitments with victims and survivors leaves office without guaranteeing immediate continuity, institutional trust is broken. For those of us who accompany cases, this means knocking on doors again, and often facing the state’s indifference,” she said.
Other cases of vicarious or gender-based violence were also supported by Hernández and the department, which has not given more details about what will happen with the dozens of pending tasks it listed last February in its office in southern Mexico City. The names rumored to replace her point to the undersecretary of the same department, Ingrid Gómez, or the Morena deputy Anaís Burgos Hernández, who this Wednesday has requested an indefinite leave to step away from her activities.
A first year, a first head out, and too many questions. President Sheinbaum faces a complex scenario in appointing a replacement for Hernández, a profile that will assume the tasks, responsibilities, and weight of a key secretariat in the president’s policy who has preferred to send one of her closest political allies to lead the electoral strategies for the ruling party.
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