On September 1, 2025, Hugo Aguilar Ortiz took the oath of office as President of Mexico’s Supreme Court of Justice. This was a historic moment. Born in the tiny municipality of San Miguel El Grande in Oaxacan, this Mixtec attorney represents the highest level of Mexican judicial authority. The image’s significance is difficult to ignore: a man whose community has long been on the periphery of Mexican institutional life is now seated at its core.
However, history is rarely tidy.
In Mexico’s June 2025 judicial elections, Aguilar Ortiz received more votes than any of the 64 candidates vying for Supreme Court seats. By itself, that accomplishment is genuine. It is surrounded by more tangled things. The ruling Morena party’s comprehensive reform, which claimed that directly electing judges would end decades of judicial corruption, led to the elections. Opponents described it as a deliberate attempt to subjugate the courts to the executive branch.
Just 13% of Mexicans cast ballots. It’s hard to wave that figure away. An election that attracted less than one in seven eligible voters indicates either deep apathy or deep mistrust for a democracy that presents itself to the world as a model. Maybe both. Sheinbaum, the president, described it as “a complete success.” Professors of constitutional law showed less enthusiasm.
It is difficult to place Aguilar Ortiz himself. At first glance, his biography seems to be that of an ardent supporter. As a young lawyer in his twenties, he was involved with some of the more controversial political movements of the time when he assisted the Zapatista Army of National Liberation in 1996 with constitutional amendments pertaining to indigenous rights. He later served as a consultant for the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, specializing in the lands and territories of indigenous peoples. These qualifications don’t belong to someone who just happened to enter the public eye.
However, there’s a feeling that the trajectory changed at some point. By 2018, Aguilar Ortiz was employed by President López Obrador at the National Institute of Indigenous Peoples, coordinating indigenous rights. In that role, he also became involved in consultations for large-scale infrastructure projects like the Maya Train, which indigenous communities in the south often opposed as being imposed rather than negotiated. Oaxaca’s indigenous rights advocates have been direct about this conflict. One such advocate wrote, “He spent almost 20 years operating for the government, not for indigenous peoples,” soon after the election results were announced.
That critique might be overly straightforward. People are altered by institutions, and occasionally individuals alter institutions from within. Which story applies here is still up for debate. The outcome of Aguilar Ortiz’s lifetime appointment to Mexico’s highest court will be far more significant than the contentious election that led to his appointment.
The new Supreme Court, which has nine justices, the majority of whom have ties to Morena, appears to have a different relationship with the executive than any court in recent Mexican history. It is genuinely unclear if independent-minded justices will uphold them in the face of institutional pressure. The governing coalition has sufficient constitutional authority to start political trials and revoke immunity. Sitting with that is not an easy task.
The age of Aguilar Ortiz is fifty-three. He has alternated between government service, international consulting, and advocacy throughout his career, which, depending on your point of view, either makes him compromised or pragmatic. Most likely, the solution is in the middle. Unquestionably, he comes to this point as a man molded by conflicting allegiances: to his Mixtec ancestry, to the communities he formerly served, and to the state that now depends on him for institutional protection.
Mexico will be observing how he strikes a balance. Many people who once supported what he was meant to stand for will also do the same.
