Two candidates for mayor of Mexican city shot within hours of each other

MEXICO CITY — Two candidates for mayor in the Mexican city of Maravatio have been gunned down within hours of each other, as experts warn the June 2 election could be the country’s most violent on record.

The widening control of drug cartels in Mexico has been described as a threat. During the last nationwide election in 2021, about three dozen candidates were killed.

The campaigns haven’t even started yet. They formally begin on Friday.

State prosecutors said Tuesday that Armando Perez was found shot to death in his car in Maravatio just before midnight. He was the mayoral candidate for the conservative National Action Party.

“This illustrates the extremely serious level of violence and lack of safety that prevails ahead of the most important elections in Mexican history,” National Action’s leader, Marko Cortes, wrote on social media.

Hours earlier, officials with the ruling Morena party confirmed their candidate, Miguel Angel Zavala, was found shot to death Monday in his car.

The Morena party state committee said in a statement that the killing of Zavala was “a cowardly and reprehensible act.” The head of the Morena party in Michoacan, Juan Pablo Celis, said Zavala had announced his intention to run but had not yet been designated as the party’s candidate.

The western state of Michoacan has been particularly hard hit by gang turf wars, with the Jalisco New Generation cartel fighting a local gang, the Viagras, for control.

The watchdog group Civic Data said in a January report on political violence that “2023 was the most violent year in our database. And everything suggests that 2024 will be worse.”