 "People gather to honour late mayor Carlos Manzo Rodríguez, who was gunned down during Day of the Dead celebrations, in Uruapan, Mexico on 1 Nov 2025. AP")
A Mayor in Mexico’s western state of Michoacán was shot dead on Saturday in front of dozens of people who had gathered for Day of the Dead festivities. The mayor of the Uruapan municipality, Carlos Alberto Manzo Rodríguez, was gunned down Saturday night in the town’s historic centre, authorities have said.
He was rushed to a nearby hospital soon after he was shot; however, state prosecutor Carlos Torres Piña said that he succumbed to injury. A city council member and a bodyguard were also injured in the incident. Omar García Harfuch, the federal security secretary investigating the matter, told journalists that the attack on the mayor was carried out by unidentified men, who shot him seven times.
The weapon was linked to two armed clashes between rival criminal groups operating in the region, he added. “No line of investigation is being ruled out to clarify this cowardly act that took the life of the mayor,” García Harfuch averred.
The mayor of a violent state
It is pertinent to note that Michoacán is seen as one of Mexico’s most violent states and is a battleground between various cartels and criminal groups fighting for control of territory. The region is also home to drug distribution routes and other illicit activities .
On Sunday, hundreds of Uruapan residents, dressed in black, held up photographs of Manzo Rodríguez. The mourners took to the town’s streets to accompany the funeral procession. They chanted “Justice, justice. Out with Morena”, a reference to the ruling party of the Mexican president, Claudia Sheinbaum .
Months before his killing, the Uruapan mayor had publicly appealed to Sheinbaum on social media for help to confront the cartels and criminal groups. He had accused Michoacán’s pro-government governor, Alfredo Ramírez Bedolla, and the state police of corruption.
At the head of the procession, a group of musicians, also dressed in black, followed and played mariachi songs. In the narrow streets of the agricultural town, dozens of police and military officers guarded the area. The attack on Manzo Rodríguez, a former Morena legislator, was captured on video and shared on social media.
Impact Shorts
More ShortsThe video shows dozens of residents and tourists enjoying the event before several gunshots ring out, and the crowd scrambles for cover. In a separate video, a person was seen lying on the ground as an official performing CPR. Manzo Rodríguez had been under police protection since December 2024, three months after taking office.
The mayor’s murder came after the death of Salvador Bastidas, mayor of the municipality of Tacámbaro, also in Michoacán. Bastidas was killed in June along with his bodyguard as he arrived at his home in the town’s Centro neighbourhood. Meanwhile, in October 2024, journalist Mauricio Cruz Solís was also shot in Uruapan shortly after interviewing Manzo Rodríguez.
With inputs from The Associated Press.