World Boxing Council President Mauricio Sulaimán and various professional boxers attended President Claudia Sheinbaum’s Monday morning press conference to help promote the federal government’s “Boxing for Peace” initiative.
Sheinbaum, Mexico’s first female president, subsequently took the opportunity to repeat a message she has conveyed before — that girls and women can aspire to be whatever they want to be.
Among other remarks, she acknowledged the OECD’s latest data on unemployment and expressed discontent with the United Kingdom’s decision to grant political asylum to the ex-wife of an incarcerated former governor of Veracruz.
Sheinbaum reiterates ‘there is no limit’ to women’s ambitions
After professional female boxers encouraged women and girls to give boxing a try, Sheinbaum highlighted that while women love their families and their children, they also have the “right” to pursue their own “growth and development.”
“… Women can be whatever we want to be,” she said.
“… Women can be presidents, governors, mayors, firefighters, police officers, soldiers, reporters, journalists, teachers, doctors [and] engineers,” Sheinbaum said.
“There is no limit,” she added.
“Las mujeres podemos ser lo que queramos”, así lo reiteró nuestra Presidenta @ClaudiaShein durante la #MañaneraDelPueblo.
Su mensaje es claro: no hay oficio o profesión que las mujeres no puedan ejercer.
Trabajamos día con día en la creación de políticas públicas que impulsen… pic.twitter.com/nktnXT20Py
— Secretaría de las Mujeres (@mujeresgobmx) February 16, 2026
Sheinbaum recalled that she saw something on social media that conveyed the message, “the worst thing is to have your dreams taken away.”
“Saying ‘you can’t be this’ is also discrimination,” she said.
“And sometimes it even comes from the family,” Sheinbaum said before providing examples of the kind of things some Mexican fathers (and mothers) might say to their daughters:
- “How are you going to study engineering, sweetie?! That’s for men.”
- “How are you going to be a mechanic?! That’s for men.”
- “How are you going to be a soldier, sweetie?! That’s for men.”
- “How are you going to be a journalist? You’ll be running around all over the place! That’s for men.”
- “How are you going to be a fighter? How are you going to be a boxer?”
Sheinbaum expressed her repudiation of such thinking before declaring, once again, that “women can be whatever we want to be.”
Sheinbaum: Low unemployment rate is a source of pride
Later in the press conference, a reporter told the president that Mexico has the second-lowest unemployment rate among the 38 member countries of the Organization for Economic Co-Operation and Development (OECD)
In fact, in December 2025, Mexico had the lowest unemployment rate among OECD countries, according to an OECD report published last Thursday.
Both Mexico and Japan had unemployment rates of 2.6% in the final month of last year, the OECD reported.
Sheinbaum said that Mexico’s low unemployment rate is “a source of pride for everyone.”
She quipped that the OECD unemployment data would be good to show to “those who say ‘the transformation doesn’t get results'” — transformation being shorthand for the Morena party-led political movement, known as the “fourth transformation,” or 4T.
Sheinbaum didn’t mention that over half of Mexico’s workforce is employed in the country’s vast informal sector.
Sheinbaum not happy with UK’s decision to grant asylum to Karime Macías
A reporter asked Sheinbaum whether her administration would “protest” the decision of the U.K. government to grant political asylum to Karime Macías, ex-wife of former Veracruz governor Javier Duarte (2010-16), who is serving a prison sentence for money laundering and links to organized crime.
Jailed ex-governor, wife divorce after charges of fraud, embezzlement
Macías, who was arrested in London in 2019 but released on bail a short time later, is wanted in Mexico in connection with her alleged involvement in an embezzlement scheme while she headed up the DIF family services agency in Veracruz. Her obtainment of political asylum in the United Kingdom, where she has now lived for around nine years, allows her to avoid extradition to Mexico.
Sheinbaum said that her government hasn’t been officially notified of the asylum decision, but declared that “we’re not in favor” of it, and “we’re going to react” to it — i.e., complain about it via diplomatic channels.
By Mexico News Daily chief staff writer Peter Davies (peter.davies@mexiconewsdaily.com)
