In early July 2025, a claim began circulating on social media that Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum sent rescue teams to Texas in response to the deadly floods that struck the state over the Fourth of July weekend.
The rumor gained significant traction after actor Viola Davis shared an Instagram post (archived) that featured a photograph of Sheinbaum alongside text praising her supposed decision to help. "Much respect Madam President," the caption read.
(Instagram user @violadavis)
The graphic, which gained over 395,000 likes as of this writing, included the lines (emphasis added):
Mexico's president just sent rescue teams to Texas. After all the hate. After all the anti-immigrant policies. After all the racism toward brown people. She still helped. She still showed up. She still did the right thing. To a red state that wouldn't do the same for her. That's leadership. That's power. That's a woman.
The image originated from a Threads post (archived) by the user @swagrman, whose username appeared on the graphic Davis shared.
The claim spread across platforms including Instagram, Bluesky, Facebook, Threads, X and TikTok, as well as in Spanish-language posts.
In short, while Mexico did assist in the flood response in Texas in early July 2025, there was no evidence that Sheinbaum ordered or coordinated the deployment of rescue teams. The personnel who assisted in search and rescue efforts in Kerr County were volunteers from the Civil Protection and Fire Department of Ciudad Acuña, Coahuila, and the nonprofit organization Fundación 911. Their deployment was made independently, in response to a request from the U.S.-based organization Texas EquuSearch, and was not coordinated by the Mexican federal government.
While Sheinbaum acknowledged and praised their efforts during a July 7, 2025, news conference, she didn't claim to have organized or authorized their deployment. The Mexican government's assistance focused on consular support for the roughly 30 Mexican nationals affected by the flooding.
Who the rescuers were and who sent them
Despite claims crediting Sheinbaum with sending rescue teams to Texas, the aid that arrived from Mexico came from a local emergency unit in Ciudad Acuña, Coahuila, a Mexican border city across from Del Rio, Texas.
(Google Maps)
On July 6, 2025, the Acuña's Civil Protection and Fire Department (Dirección de Protección Civil y Bomberos de Acuña) announced on Facebook that its water rescue team, along with firefighters and members of Fundación 911, departed to assist with flood search efforts in Kerrville, Texas. According to the post, the team responded to a request from Texas EquuSearch, a U.S.-based volunteer search-and-rescue organization. The volunteers worked in coordination with local U.S. authorities to help locate missing persons along the flooded Guadalupe River.