As President Trump refuses any federal role in delivering health care to the American people (we've got endless wars to pay for) Mexico remains on course to deliver a system of universal health care as a matter of right by 2030.
Almost two weeks ago, Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum pointed out an important difference between the two countries that helps account for the ironic discrepancy: "The United States values material things; Mexico its indigenous peoples." The occasion was Sheinbaum's visit to the indigenous Seri community in Sonora to officially open an aqueduct to provide the people with daily access to water for the first time in their history (following centuries of colonial repression, including open attempts at extermination), a material benefit of far greater importance than the consumer trophies that regularly provoke shopper stampedes in the United States.
After highlighting the legacy and values that the indigenous peoples have handed down to the entire country, Sheinbaum contrasted it with U.S. ideology, which, she affirmed, grants more importance to material things and the accumulation of wealth.
"Mexico has that great fortune, that immense privilege to descend from those indigenous peoples. Some people think that Mexican history began when the Spaniards arrived to invade the territory. But no, the history of this land spans thousands of years," she stressed.
And to illustrate that privilege, she compared it with that of "our neighbor to the North: they principally value material things. They decided that happiness has to do with what is accumulated, with the amount of wealth one has. According to this idea, the more wealth one has, the happier one is. But that's false, because happiness comes from values, from community."
More recently, during the inauguration of the new Rosario Castellanos University campus in the Yucatan, Sheinbaum criticized the "excesses" of the neo-liberal period, promising that the corrupt officials of that era will not be able to steal the political transformation of recent years from the Mexican people. (In Mexico, the political transformation underway since Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador was elected in 2018 is known as "the Fourth Transformation," the first three having been, in order, independence from Spain, the War of Reform (over the 1857 Constitution), and the Mexican Revolution of 1910.)
Speaking before the assembled students, whom she reminded that this year marks forty years since the student struggles that achieved free tuition at the National Autonomous University of Mexico, which Sheinbaum herself participated in, and in the midst of tensions the country faces with the United States, the president emphasized that "nothing is going to steal transformation from the Mexican people, which belongs to the people. No foreign government is going to steal transformation from the Mexican people."
Sheinbaum went on to condemn neo-liberalism for having reduced social guarantees to commodities, which resulted in education, for one, being given only to those who had the means to pay for it. Under the pretext of their having failed the admissions exam, the rights of all the students who had completed middle school and high school were revoked.
President Sheinbaum went on to emphasize how different Mexico's current education policy is from this, with the number of student scholarships increasing annually since the Morena party came to power in 2018. "Why can we do this?" she asked rhetorically. "Why couldn't we do it before? For one simple reason: we aren't corrupt, we don't steal the people's money."
Later, on social media, the president re-affirmed the message about continuing Morena's political transformation of Mexico: "Today, the people are awake, aware, and organized. And because of that we say to you firmly: neither the corrupt old guard that wants to return to power, nor those who seek to use this movement to protect their personal interests, nor any foreign government that wants to impose conditions on our nation, are going to break the dignity of the Mexican people."
Sheinbaum asserted that Mexico's political transformation sustains itself on the force of its popular movement, that in these times decisions are not made by elites, nor in conformity with foreign economic interests. "As long as that unity for justice, democracy, and dignity exists, the transformation will continue."
In inaugurating the new Rosario Castellanos university campus, the president underscored the social vision of Morena, not only in the education sphere, but also with respect to other rights like access to health care and housing. "It's not, if you have the money, go get your medicine, nor is it, if you have money, pay up, and if not, then what?" It may be an uphill battle, but we're insistent: access to health care is a right of the Mexican people and we're going to honor it fully."
Meanwhile, in the United States, people have the right to prostitute themselves to massive centers of private wealth (directly or indirectly), if they are able to, and receive health "benefits" at the discretion of their employer, for whom they are a cost to be minimized, not a fundamental right to be honored.
Sources:
Nestor Jimenez, "Sheinbaum Inaugurates Aqueduct For Seri Community in Sonora," La Jornada (Spanish), May 8, 2026
Alonso Urrutia,"No Foreign Government Will Snatch The Transformation Away From Mexico: Sheinbaum," La Jornada (Spanish), May 17, 2026
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