Héctor DE MAULEÓN

Image Credit: Bernardino Hernández / Associated Press / Alamy Stock Photo

Journalist, historian and writer Héctor de Mauleón faced judicial harassment in 2025 in connection with his journalistic reporting. On 1 May 2025, De Mauleón published his regular column En tercera persona (In Third Person) in the Mexican daily El Universal, in which he reported on alleged corruption and family links between public officials and Tania Contreras López, the ruling political party’s candidate for magistrate in the upcoming elections.  

The candidate filed a formal complaint for defamation and political gender-based violence against the journalist. Although the complaint was initially dismissed by the authorities, the candidate appealed the decision, which overturned the ruling and ordered the initiation of a special sanctioning procedure against de Mauleón and El Universal. 

On 15 May 2025, the Electoral Institute of Tamaulipas (IETAM) imposed precautionary measures on the journalist, ordering the removal of the article from El Universal’s website and instructing him to refrain from publishing further content concerning Contreras López, but the newspaper didn’t remove the article. 

Héctor de Mauleón (1963) is the author of the books La perfecta espiral, Como nada en el mundo, and El secreto de la Noche Triste, among others. He began his career in journalism in 1989. Since then, he has written about the past and present of Mexico City in the country’s most important newspapers and magazines.