At National Reforestation Day event, Sheinbaum floats new name for historic passage

On Sunday, President Claudia Sheinbaum inaugurated the 2026 National Reforestation Campaign at the historic Paso de Cortés, a natural passage connecting the Popocatépetl and Iztaccíhuatl volcanoes in central Mexico. The event marked a shift in the passage's name to "Paso de los Pueblos Indígenas" (Pass of the Indigenous Peoples), a change Sheinbaum argued was long overdue.

The current name of the passage honors Spanish conquistador Hernán Cortés, who traversed the region during his quest to Tenochtitlan following the Cholula massacre in 1519. However, Sheinbaum emphasized that the name disregarded the history of Indigenous peoples who inhabited and traversed the area before the arrival of the conquistadores. She noted that the name change was "no coincidence" as it coincided with the International Day of the World’s Indigenous Peoples.

Sheinbaum’s administration has previously taken steps to rectify historical narratives, such as renaming Puerto de Alvarado Avenue in Mexico City from Pedro de Alvarado's name to Calzada México-Tenochtitlan in 2021. The name change was announced during Sheinbaum’s work tour in Puebla, where she also established August's second Sunday as National Reforestation Day to make forest, mountain, river, and natural area restoration a permanent nationwide activity.

During the event, Agriculture and Rural Development Minister Columba López Gutiérrez announced that 241,000 people participated in the reforestation effort on Sunday alone, planting over six million trees, 1.7 million seeds, and dispersing 500,000 seeds via drones in hard-to-reach areas. The ministry aims to plant 1.5 billion plants, trees, and seeds during the remaining four years of Sheinbaum’s administration.