"Burgeoning extortion has not grabbed the headlines, but it's been the all-the-more corrosive fallout of a security strategy that never merited the label," said Falko Ernst, a senior analyst at the International Crisis Group. Lopez Obrador denies his strategy has fed impunity, but said after the villagers' bloody takedown of extortionists in Texcapilla, some 75 miles (120 km) southwest of Mexico City, that Mexico must fight the problem. Security frequently tops polls of voters' chief concerns ahead of the June 2 presidential election to succeed Lopez Obrador, who under Mexican law cannot run again. Sheinbaum has defended the administration, while also pledging "zero impunity" and highlighting her own record on security in Mexico City, where murders fell far more sharply. A recent study by a Mexican Senate think tank said Mexico suffers some 13,000 acts of extortion daily.

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Persons: Dave Graham MEXICO, Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador, Lopez, it's, Falko Ernst, Lopez Obrador, abrazos, Lopez Obrador's, Mexico City Mayor Claudia Sheinbaum, Sheinbaum, Ernst, Mexico's, extortioners, Carlos Heredia, Dave Graham, Lizbeth Diaz, Alistair Bell Organizations: Dave Graham MEXICO CITY, Crisis, Mexico City Mayor, Army Locations: Texcapilla, Mexico City, Mexico, Mexican