Sheinbaum's Approval Slips as State Orders Platforms

On 14 October, Mexico’s government ordered digital platforms to restrict minors’ access to online content, while a new poll put President Claudia Sheinbaum’s approval at 69.1%, the lowest of 16 weekly readings since 1 July. Companies have 30 calendar days from 14 October to document and report their actions. The decree sets no penalties for now.

The state sets the terms

The MetricsMx poll, published by SDP Noticias on Monday 19 October, found that 57.7% of respondents approved of Sheinbaum a lot and 11.4% approved somewhat. Another 19.6% disapproved, 7.9% were neutral and 3.4% didn’t know. Approval stood at 69.4% on 7 October, 70.4% on 30 September, 70.9% on 1 July and 75.3% on 29 July. The report said the latest rating was 1.3 points below the 30 September reading and 6.2 points below the 29 July reading; that 1.3-point dip fell within the poll’s margin of error.

The government published its decree on safe digital environments for children and teenagers in the Diario Oficial de la Federación, Mexico’s official gazette, on 14 October. Officials presented the text on 9 October. It bars platforms from allowing minors to access or receive recommendations for content promoting harassment, sexual abuse, hate speech, violent extremism, pornography, suicide, self-harm or eating disorders.

Platforms must check ages using methods beyond a user’s own declaration, immediately remove offending accounts and content, set the strictest privacy settings by default for new accounts, and maintain a 24-hour contact point for prosecutors. The order puts companies under a government deadline, but the current text sets no penalties. Platforms have until around 13 November to document and report their actions.

Approval, enforcement and the limits of the poll

Sheinbaum called the rules mandatory and said a law with sanctions would follow if platforms failed to comply. On 13 October, she said platforms “totally agreed,” Infobae México reported. El Informador listed Meta, Microsoft, Apple, TikTok, Google, X and Huawei as willing to implement the decree, but reported no public statements from those companies. The decree names no company.

The MetricsMx survey found that 78.9% of respondents favoured requiring digital platforms to protect children and teenagers from violent content and harassment. Specifically, 67.7% very much agreed and 11.2% somewhat agreed that the government should require those protections, while 15.7% disagreed.

That support contrasts with a different result from 5 August. In that survey, the same pollster found 71.2% named parents or guardians as chiefly responsible for protecting minors on social networks, compared with 9.2% who named platform owners and 3.1% who named the government. The October question differed, so the figures aren’t a before-and-after test.

MetricsMx surveyed 800 adults on 14 October using automated calls, a recorded voice and keypad responses. It weighted results by gender, age and state, and reported a margin of error of plus or minus 3.46 points at 95% confidence. SDP Noticias didn’t publish a response rate or the exact question wording. The report said it wasn’t known who commissioned and paid for the poll series; its results appeared in SDP Noticias reports and not on metricsmx.com, which redirects to the consultancy Metrics.

Other polling offered different snapshots. El Financiero found 70% approval and 30% disapproval in a telephone poll of 800 adults conducted between 10 and 20 September. Mitofsky put Sheinbaum at 72% for September, as reported by Político MX. The firms asked different questions at different times. The report also records no grassroots organizing or mutual-aid response to the decree; its account centers on government orders, corporate compliance and polling figures.