Phone-number posts decried in Mexico

MEXICO CITY — The eldest son of Mexico’s president and the governing party’s presidential candidate said Saturday that their telephone numbers were published on social media and that they have received threats and insults. Both denounced the action.

The incident came a day after President Andrés Manuel López Obrador disclosed the phone number of a reporter for The New York Times, which published a story about a U.S. probe into claims that López took money from drug traffickers. López Obrador denied the allegations.

The first to report the release of his phone number was the president’s oldest son, José Ramón López Beltrán, who wrote on X, formerly known as Twitter, that he considered the action “a kind of vengeance” and said it puts his family in danger.

It wasn’t immediately clear who made the number public. López Beltrán said the incident began with a letter that contained “threats and lies” directed at the president and his sons. He did not elaborate.

On Saturday, Mexico’s president told reporters that it was “embarrassing for them to act that way,” referring to everyone involved.

He spoke while visiting the city of Mazatlan and once again criticized The New York Times report, saying, “We are not taking a single step back in the defense of liberty and justice.”

López Beltrán said it was the second time that his phone number has been published and noted he also has been harassed by cameras and drones everywhere he has lived.

López Beltrán also blamed The New York Times reporter, Natalie Kitroeff, for her phone number being made public, saying she provided the number “thinking that the president would respond to her slander.”