Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum has called for the country's electoral institute to be cleaned up and its contracting made transparent, after a federal investigation identified election-material contracts worth 2.74 billion pesos concentrated among a small group of companies.

The investigation was presented on 5 November by Raquel Buenrostro, Mexico's Secretary for Anti-Corruption and Good Government. It found that companies linked to brothers José Alfredo and Raymundo Francisco Hernández Casillas received contracts worth 2,740.3 million pesos between 2015 and 2025 from electoral bodies across the country.

According to the investigation, 2,094 million pesos of that total was awarded between 2015 and 2023, when 23 of Mexico's 32 state electoral bodies gave contracts to the companies. A further 646.3 million pesos was awarded in 2024 and 2025 by 15 state electoral bodies.

Sheinbaum questioned why the slogan "Don't touch the INE" had been used to defend the National Electoral Institute, suggesting it may have shielded the contracting arrangements from scrutiny. She also questioned former INE president Lorenzo Córdova, asking why he had not acted to stop the concentration of contracts while he led the institute's General Council.

The president said the Superior Audit Office of the Federation should review the contracts and determine whether there are grounds for administrative or criminal responsibility, and that the Attorney General's Office could become involved if the evidence justified it. Mexico's Financial Intelligence Unit has frozen accounts linked to the case.

Sheinbaum also said the government will present a decree next week to strengthen Talleres Gráficos de México, the state printing agency, so that more election material is produced by the state itself.

The Somos party, which the government linked to the case, has rejected the accusations and announced it will sue Sheinbaum and Buenrostro for defamation. No finding of wrongdoing has been reported.

[Source: sonorapresente.com](https://sonorapresente.com/en/2026/11/sheinbaum-lashes-out-at-dont-touch-the-ine-slogan-alleges-it-may-have-covered-up-a-multimillion-peso-electoral-mafia/) | [Source: prensamercosur.org](https://prensamercosur.org/2026/11/07/mexico-sheinbaum-vincula-una-red-de-contratistas-del-ine-con-el-salinismo/)