Two close aides of Mexico City mayor shot dead in daylight attack

Clara Brugada’s personal secretary Ximena Guzmán and her adviser José Muñoz were killed on Tuesday morning, in what experts believe was an organised crime hit.

Mexico City Mayor Clara Brugada’s personal secretary Ximena Guzmán and adviser José Muñoz were assassinated as they travelled to work on Tuesday morning, the country’s authorities have said. The two were shot dead at around 7 am on a busy thoroughfare in the capital’s Moderna neighbourhood. An investigation has been launched into their murders, which experts say show the hallmarks of an organised crime hit. It is the worst attack in recent years against public officials in the capital — where political violence is less common than in other parts of the country. Photos from the crime scene show an Audi’s windscreen riddled with bullet holes. Mexico security analyst David Saucedo, who questioned why someone as senior as Guzmán did not have a security detail, said the murders were likely carried out to put pressure on Brugada’s administration.Mexican President Sheinbaum, of the Morena party to which Brugada also belongs, condemned the killings at her daily morning press conference. “We will not let this cowardly act go unpunished,” said Omar García Harfuch, the country’s security minister who survived an assassination attempt five years ago while he was the city’s police chief. Brugada paid tribute to Guzmán and Muñoz shortly after their deaths, before vowing to continue her administration’s “relentless fight against insecurity”. Mexico capital’s mayor, who had worked with them both for years, called Guzmán a “wonderful, tireless” person and described Muñoz as “one of the most intelligent people” she had ever met. “We in the city’s cabinet are shocked and mourn the loss of two dear comrades,” Brugada said. Homicides in Mexico City in the first quarter of 2025 were slightly up from the same period the previous year. The murders on Tuesday follow the recent killings of political figures elsewhere in the country, including a mayoral candidate in Veracruz state who was gunned down along with three others at a campaign rally earlier this month.