A large protest in Mexico City against insecurity and corruption turned violent on Saturday, with some protesters attacking police in the capital’s central square, injuring 100 officers, according to authorities.
A protest march from the Angel of Independence monument to the Zócalo, Mexico City’s main plaza, was organized by a Generation Z movement, but attracted people of all ages, including members of the Sombrero Movement (Movimiento del Sombrero), a group founded by Carlos Manzo, the sombrero-wearing “tough on crime” mayor of Uruapan, Michoacán, who was assassinated on Nov. 1.
‘Tenemos una Presidenta que le está dando atole con el dedo a todas las familias buscadoras de desaparecidos’, acusan manifestantes durante la marcha de la Gen Z, en un mensaje dirigido a Claudia Sheinbaum y a Morena.https://t.co/JrWhp0VTWk
📹 Mayumi Suzuki pic.twitter.com/ccmbl9CMfP— REFORMA (@Reforma) November 8, 2025
A total of 17,000 people participated in the march, according to the Mexico City government, but some media reports indicated that the turnout was significantly larger.
The “Generación Z México” movement, which called for people to take to the streets in Mexico City via a social media account, says it is non-partisan, but anti-government and anti-Morena sentiment was on prominent display during the march.
Generation Z encompasses people born between 1997 and 2012.
Protest marches were also held in dozens of other Mexican cities on Saturday, including Guadalajara, Monterrey, León, Toluca and Uruapan, where Manzo was shot in the city’s central square during a Day of the Dead event.
The ‘black bloc’
The Mexico City government said in a statement that a “black bloc” group of protesters was responsible for violence during Saturday’s protest march. It said that “around 1,000 people in masks” entered the Zócalo and using hammers and other tools “violently” tore down barriers that had been put up to protect the National Palace, Mexico’s seat of executive power and the residence of President Claudia Sheinbaum.
The government also said that “violent groups” made “direct attacks” on police, hitting officers, stealing their shields and launching explosive devices at them.
The Associated Press reported that “protesters attacked police with stones, fireworks, sticks and chains.”
Clashes between protesters and police lasted for some three hours, the newspaper El Universal reported. The Supreme Court building, located next to the National Palace, was also targeted by “black bloc” protesters.
The Mexico City government said that 100 police officers were injured, 40 of whom were transferred to the hospital for medical assessment. Twenty other people were also injured, according to Mexico City Security Minister Pablo Vázquez.
Police responded to the violence with tear gas, which affected “everyone” in the Zócalo, El Sol de México reported. The newspaper La Jornada reported that police were accused of using excessive force against protesters and committing “indiscriminate abuses,” including stealing cell phones from demonstrators.
Police kicked protesters and hit them with their shields, according to La Jornada. “Paramedics attended to dozens of injured people,” the newspaper wrote.
The Mexico City government said that police “exclusively carried out containment work, without responding to provocations.”
It said that 40 people were arrested, 20 for “administrative” offenses and 20 others on more serious charges.
Vázquez, according to the government statement, said that leaders from Mexico’s political “right” led the protest and that “few” young people participated in it. He criticized “the opposition” for “resorting to violence instead of expressing their differences peacefully and through arguments.”
Sheinbaum, who was in the state of Tabasco on Saturday, denounced the violence and asserted that “very few young people” took part in the protest, despite it being organized by members of Generation Z.
‘Out with Morena, out with Claudia’
The Straw Hat Pirates’ Jolly Roger, a flag that features in the Japanese manga series “One Piece,” was held aloft by some protesters, as was the case in previous Gen Z protests in countries including Nepal and Madagascar. Other protesters carried Mexican flags and signs and banners that criticized the ruling Morena party and Sheinbaum.
Among the slogans chanted by protesters in Mexico City were “Out with Morena!” and “Out with Claudia!” as well as “We want peace!” and “We’re not bots!”
Sheinbaum had accused opposition parties of infiltrating the Gen Z movement, and using social media bots to increase attendance at the protest in the capital, the largest anti-government demonstration since the president took office in October 2024.
While the protest focused on denouncing violence, including the assassination of Manzo, and demanding greater security, protesters also condemned corruption, the alleged concentration of power in the federal executive, high levels of impunity, medicine shortages and the missing persons crisis.
“We are all Carlos Manzo,” read one large banner carried by protesters from Uruapan, among whom was the murdered mayor’s grandmother, who was pushed along in a wheelchair.
Some protesters accused the federal government of killing Manzo, who was allegedly shot by a 17-year-old who was later killed by a municipal police officer following his arrest.
The mayor had been critical of the federal government’s security strategy and had urged it to ramp up the fight against organized crime.
Andrés Massa, a 29-year-old business consultant who carried the Jolly Roger flag during the Mexico City march, told the Associated Press that “we need more security.”
Arizbeth Garcia, a 43-year-old doctor, told AP that she was participating in the protest to call for more funding for the public health system and for increased security because doctors “are also exposed to the insecurity gripping the country, where you can be murdered and nothing happens.”
Rosa María Ávila, a 65-year-old real estate agent from Pátzcuaro, Michoacán, who traveled to Mexico City to join the protest, asserted that “the state is dying.”
She told AP that Manzo “was killed because he was a man who was sending officers into the mountains to fight delinquents.”
“He had the guts to confront them,” Ávila added.
An 80-year-old woman in a wheelchair told El Universal that Mexico is currently in its “worst moment of violence,” even though homicides have declined during Sheinbaum’s presidency.
Doña Mariana, as El Universal identified the woman, accused the Sheinbaum administration of being a “narco-government,” and complained that it believes that “a pension of 3,000 pesos” per month is enough to live on.
Manzo’s grandmother, Doña Raquel, asserted that “Morena killed my grandson,” and called on former Michoacán governor and current Morena Deputy Leonel Godoy to be investigated in connection with the crime.
In Guadalajara, another “black bloc” group attacked the Government Palace in the Jalisco state capital. Around 20,000 people joined the protest in that city, where protesters also denounced insecurity and directed blame for the situation to the federal government.
With reports from El Universal, EFE, Quadratín, El Sol de México, Reforma, La Jornada, AP and Reuters
