In 2005, when he made a longshot attempt to run for president, the founder of one of Mexico’s largest pharmacy chains came out in favour of abortion. At the time, it was a deeply divisive opinion in the Latin American country, where 88% of the population had identified as Catholic in the census five years earlier.
But as pro-abortion demonstrations and campaigns grew, leading many Mexican states to legalise abortion and the Supreme Court to decriminalise it nationwide last year, Víctor González Torres’ opinion changed. In the past seven years, the foundation affiliated with his business empire gave $86,394 to an influential group that tries to prevent pregnant people from exercising their legal right to abortion.
González Torres’ Dr Simi Foundation is not alone. openDemocracy has uncovered a wave of dark money flowing from 22 foundations run by Mexico’s most influential families and businesses to Vida y Familia, or Vifac, a non-profit organisation that runs a network of 37 ‘crisis pregnancy centres’. These clinics claim to provide pregnant women with information about reproductive health, but instead strongly discourage them from having abortions, often by bombarding them with disinformation.
openDemocracy spent six months combing through extensive tax and corporate records to reveal that between 2017 and 2023, these foundations gave a combined $1.9m to Vifac, whose name is a Spanish acronym for ‘Life and Family’. Their donations – equivalent to 10% of Vifac’s total revenue during that time – helped the network to spread its controversial agenda against women’s healthcare and reproductive choices across Mexico.
These 22 foundations span almost every sector. Among the ten that gave the most to Vifac are finance and construction firms, pharmacies, retail and supermarket chains, leading baking, soft drinks and tequila companies and maquilas – foreign-owned factories taking advantage of cheap labour to assemble products for export.
Some of the foundations were founded by families that have long publicly objected to abortions, others claim to support gender equality and reproductive health rights. One of the foundations is a controversial nonprofit institution that is supposed to distribute tax collected by the state government of Chihuahua to support vulnerable people, while another has close links to the owner of José Cuervo, the world’s largest tequila producer.
Taken together, this pattern of donations reveals a familiar trend of wealthy families and influential businesses using the guise of charity to advance an anti-abortion agenda that places the health of some of Mexico’s most vulnerable women at risk.
These donors can “influence and exert power in different fields of society”, said Sandra Cardona, a member of Red Necesito Abortar (I Need an Abortion Network), which supports women before, during and after the abortion process. “They operate in an organised and strategic way to limit or remove fundamental rights,” she added.
openDemocracy contacted all the 22 foundations for comment. Only a few responded, their answers are reflected in the piece.
Although it has been almost a year since the Mexican Supreme Court decriminalised abortion nationwide, many women in the country are still unable to access safe terminations. Just 14 of the country’s 32 states have legalised abortion up to 12 weeks, while a federal decree that requires public and private hospitals and clinics to provide healthcare – including abortions and emergency contraception – to victims of domestic, gender and sexual violence is often overlooked.
Access to abortions is particularly limited in the conservative northern states along the US border, where women’s health advocates are often forced to work in secret due to harassment by anti-abortion groups and because abortion is still illegal in some of these states. Vifac runs a number of well-funded ‘crisis pregnancy centres’ in these areas, which lure in people seeking an abortion with the promise of free pregnancy tests and ultrasounds, and online adverts that suggest they merely want to offer information to help people choose their next steps.
For instance, openDemocracy found various Spanish-language posts on websites and Facebook pages affiliated with Vifac that carry ostensibly pro-choice messaging such as “terminate a pregnancy”, “enjoy your freedom and your bodily autonomy” and “remember that you decide on your body”. But sources familiar with Vifac’s practices in northern Mexico said this messaging is meant to attract the attention of those considering an abortion, only to subsequently dissuade them with disinformation about the health and legal implications of terminating their pregnancies. Vifac has also been accused of convincing women to carry unwanted pregnancies to term and then irregularly offering these children up for adoption according to media reports.
“I wanted to help women avoid abortions,” Vifac founder Marilú Mariscal told an event hosted by the World Congress of Families, an American-led global coalition that promotes Christian right values internationally, in Mexico City in October 2022.
Neither Vifac nor Mariscal agreed to answer openDemocracy’s questions.
Vifac, which runs 36 crisis pregnancy centres in Mexico (and one in Brownsville, Texas), declared $21.4m in revenue to the Mexican tax authorities between 2017 and 2023 – around $3m a year.
But it is increasingly opaque about the sources of this funding. While Vifac is not legally required to disclose the names of its donors, its website did previously list 35 benefactors, including companies and corporate foundations, but the page has been down for 15 months.
But rather than naming any of its donors on tax records, Vifac simply records donations in the following categories: $12.9m from private and corporate foundations; $6.9m from individuals; $1.3m from public funds; and $112,000 from unidentified foreign donors. Another $190,000 has no specified origin.
Many of Vifac’s donors also appear circumspect about being publicly associated with the organisation. Of the 35 donors Vifac previously named on its website, only nine independently declared these donations to the tax authorities between 2017 and 2023. Others may have channelled money through other routes, such as in-kind donations, which should be declared to tax authorities but often slip through the cracks. It is also possible that some were historic donors whose names had not been removed from the Vifac website. openDemocracy also uncovered 13 additional foundations that were not mentioned on Vifac’s website, but the tax filings of these foundations revealed they donated funds to the anti-abortion group.
North: Taxpayers money, opacity and violence
Chihuahua is Mexico’s largest state, with almost four million inhabitants. Internationally, it is perhaps best known for its extensive border with the United States and the growing wave of migrants that cross it, as well as the spike in sexual violence against many of the women and girls travelling to the border. Nearly 2,400 femicides have been reported and almost 300 women and girls disappeared in Juárez, the state’s largest city, since the early 1990s.
It is also home to the Fundación del Empresariado Chihuahuense (Chihuahuan Businesses Fou FECHAC), a controversial nonprofit set up by prominent businesses from the region and funded by a surcharge on the tax paid by Chihuahua’s businesses and employers. These surcharge taxes are collected by the state’s Ministry of Finance and pooled in a trust fund that FECHAC administers to address the health, education and infrastructure needs of vulnerable populations. Last year, FECHAC’s trust received more than $30m.
FECHAC is one of Vifac’s biggest funders. Of the $1.9m donations to Vifac that openDemocracy could trace, FECHAC donated over a third, or $719,620.
These funds were used to run crisis pregnancy centres in Juárez and Chihuahua City, as well as going towards Yo Amo la Vida (I Love Life), a Vifac programme that says offer sexual education based on chastity and religious values and is registered as a tax-exempt nonprofit in 2015 in Las Delicias city.
FECHAC was established in 1996 and registered as a tax-exempt nonprofit, a status that allows a charity to receive income tax-deductible donations.
But in 2019, Mexico’s tax administration service, known by its Spanish acronym SAT, revoked this tax-exempt status, arguing that FECHAC had “failed to comply with the duty to allocate its assets exclusively to the goals of its corporate purpose”. The foundation appealed this decision all the way to the Supreme Court of Justice, which ultimately backed the SAT’s decision. At the time of publishing, donations to FECHAC are no-longer tax exempt.
Several public audits, most recently in 2020, have warned of a lack of transparency in FECHAC’s financial and accounting management, and conflicts of interest in some of its contracting.
FECHAC did not respond to openDemocracy’s requests for an interview.
Activist Mariela Castro Flores, spokesperson for Marea Verde Chihuahua group and researcher with the Alliance for the Defense of the Secular State (Adela) told openDemocracy: “Vifac and its programme Yo Amo La Vida, managed to access to public schools to promote sexual education based on religious values, chastity and self control on the guise to ‘prevent adolescent pregnancy”.
Castro Flores added: “They use public money to promote their agendas contrary to human rights and the federal government guidelines”.
In total, openDemocracy has found that 60% of the money donated to Vifac by the 22 foundations went towards funding centres in northern Mexico, according to the information reported by the corporate charitable organisations to tax authorities.
Other Vifac funders in Chihuahua and two other northern states, Nuevo León and Tamaulipas, include the Association of Maquilas and Exporters of Chihuahua (which gave $41,049 to Vifac); the Rosario Campos de Fernández Foundation, which was created by three companies in 1994 to support education projects and gave $38,129; energy and food holding company Xignux which gave $37,621. The construction and steel firms Grupo Cementos de Chihuahua donated $30,885, Grupo Frisa donated $16,558 and DeAcero gave $20,336.
Last year, openDemocracy reported on the tactics that Vifac and other ultra-conservative actors deploy in these northern areas to obstruct access to abortions. Many of these tactics break laws and health protocols. Our report also revealed how healthcare staff and law enforcement in the region systematically fail to comply with federal regulations that ensure the right to abortion and emergency contraception for rape survivors.
At the time, Vifac Mexico’s communications director, Teresa Eguiluz, told openDemocracy: “We regret to inform you that we did not find substantiation, solid evidence and hard data to support the findings presented by you…
“At Vifac, we are committed to transparency and integrity in our activities and programmes. Our aim is to restore the human and social rights of pregnant women in difficult or vulnerable situations and to offer them alternatives for their development and that of their children.”
Philanthropy and hypocrisy
Both Vifac and half of the 22 foundations that openDemocracy found to be donating to it claim to be committed to and comply with the UN’s Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). These goals include gender equality, the elimination of violence against women and girls, and universal access to sexual and reproductive health and rights.
One such donor, the Beckmann Foundation, gave a total of $50,961 to Vifac in 2017 and 2019 and helped Vifac staff to organise talks for teenagers against abortion and emergency contraception and run workshops on the “risks of early sexuality” for high school students.
The Beckmann Foundation is owned by the world's largest tequila producer, José Cuervo; its president, Juan Domingo Beckmann, is José Cuervo’s CEO and the eighth richest person in Mexico, according to Forbes.
Pro-choice activist Cardona of Red Necesito Abortar told openDemocracy: “SDGs include access to safe and legal abortion and to comprehensive sexual education. Without this, there’s no real sustainable development nor effective gender equality.”
The corporate foundation of the Soriana supermarket chain – one of Mexico’s largest, with 798 shops and revenues of $9.6bn in 2022 – is another Vifac donor that says it is committed to the SDGs.
The foundation, which is chaired by Soriana CEO Ricardo Martín Bringas, was launched in 2004 to “actively support institutions and associations in communities where Soriana has a presence” and to develop the company’s social responsibility and sustainability actions.
On its website, the organisation also says it is aligned with the UN Global Compact, a commitment for corporations to implement ten principles on human rights, labour standards, environment and anti-corruption and to promote the SDGs.
Holding company Gigante – which owns 13 real estate and restaurant firms operating in Mexico, Costa Rica, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, Panama, Chile and Colombia – has channelled $63,549 to Vifac through its corporate foundation since 2017.
The foundation claims to be committed to achieving the SDGs and the UN Global Compact Principles. Its 2022 annual report says: “Through collaboration with Vifac, we supported 605 women through health and nutrition programmes specially designed to accompany them in their pregnancy process.” This support, it says, contributes to the tenth sustainable development goal, reducing inequalities, and to the “promotion of human rights”.
In total, 15 of the 22 foundations donating to Vifac have joined the 10 UN Global Compact Principles. Lawyer Adalberto Méndez said their donations to an anti-abortion outfit show that businesses do not always carry out the non-binding due diligence checks they agree to when signing up the Global Compact and the 10 UN Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights.
These due diligence checks suggest that all the aid donated by a business and its philanthropic arm, if it has one, “has to have certain traceability”, added Méndez, a coordinator of the Social Business and Human Rights Clinic at the law school of the Universidad Iberoamericana in Mexico City. “Otherwise you could be donating money to causes contrary to human dignity.”
In a written answer, a spokesperson for the UN Global Compact said: "The initiative is not mandated to regulate or monitor participants' performance. However, we have a set of Integrity Measures to safeguard the UN Global Compact." The spokesperson mentioned that they "support companies to be more ambitious and transparent in their efforts to implement the 10 Principles and make progress on the Sustainable Development Goals", but added: "As a matter of policy, we do not comment on allegations about individual companies or on any process established under our Integrity Measures."
I favour abortion with certain rules (...) My issue is health, not morality, the church is for moralityVíctor González Torres ‘Dr. Simi’
Pharmacy chain Farmacias Similares has sold low-cost, unbranded drugs since 1997 and now has more than 9,600 shops in Mexico, Chile and Guatemala (and a recent arrival in Colombia).
Not content with business success alone, Farmacias Similares’ founder, Víctor González Torres, sought to become Mexico’s president in 2005. At the time, he expressed an open stance on abortion, telling an interviewer: “I favour abortion with certain rules (...) My issue is health, not morality, the church is for morality.”
But Farmacias Similares’ philanthropic arm, the Dr Simi Foundation, gave 80 grants worth $86,394 (either in cash or in-kind) to Vifac centres in 16 Mexican states and to the network’s national headquarters between 2017 and 2023.
The foundation also donated $32,629 to three other anti-abortion groups, according to its financial filings. Its mission is “to improve the quality of life of people living in extreme poverty”.
In March, González Torres was named a knight of the order of St. Gregory the Great by the Vatican. Weeks earlier, his son Víctor González Herrera, who has taken over the running of the pharmacy chain and the foundation, joined Unicef's International Council, a group of 147 philanthropists committed to “a more equitable world for children and to achieving the Sustainable Development Goals”.
Neither the businessman nor Dr Simi’s Foundation responded to openDemocracy's questions.
Nacional Monte de Piedad (National Mount of Piety), a pawnshop chain with more than 300 branches across Mexico, has been funding Vifac longer than any other donor openDemocracy found, having made annual contributions since 2008.
Between 2017 and 2023, it transferred $389,909 to Vifac centres in the states of Culiacán, Monterrey, Sonora, Yucatán and to Vifac Mexico (which has branches in the capital city and in the neighbouring State of Mexico).
Monte de Piedad, the oldest financial institution in Latin America, allocates its operating surpluses to social purposes to “close inequality gaps and fight poverty”. According to its 2023 annual report, its actions are in line with the SDGs.
The company told openDemocracy that “the projects presented by Vifac have met our selection criteria”, which includes a procedure to “verify legal, fiscal and administrative compliance by civil society organisations”. It added: “We respect the autonomy and ideologies of civil society organisations.”
Vifac’s third largest donor, at $167,044, is the Sertull Foundation, owned by the Servitje Montull family. The family, well-known for its conservative positions and support to religious groups, was the fourth wealthiest in Mexico last year, according to Fobes.
Lorenzo Servitje Montull co-founded Grupo Bimbo, a bakery giant with a presence in 35 countries, in 1945 and today his son Daniel still owns more than a third of the company’s shares and is its CEO.
María Cecilia Gabriela Servitje Montull, Daniel’s sister, chairs the family foundation, which says it is committed to “people and communities in vulnerable situations being able to overcome their deficiencies and backwardness” and guides itself by “gender equity” and a “rights-based approach”.
In a written response to openDemocracy, Sertull’s communications officer, Zazil Canto, said: “We are an independent organisation, with governance processes autonomous from any corporate group.”
Another influential Vifac donor is the Borges Coppel Foundation, the philanthropic arm of Coppel, a retail giant that owns a chain of more than 1,600 clothing and footwear shops across Mexico, as well as a bank and a pension funds manager.
The Borges Coppel Foundation, which was established by a member of the Coppel family “for the purpose of donating private funds, not company funds”, gave Vifac $87,434 between 2017 and 2023.
In an email to openDemocracy, the foundation’s chief operating officer, Beatriz Castillo, said it is independent of the business group and that she and the foundation’s president, Cecilia Coppel Calvo, are in charge of vetting the charities they give money to.
“One of the core values that guide our selection of alliances is the protection of life,” Castillo said. “We firmly believe that life begins at the moment of conception and that it is our duty to protect it at all stages.”
Castillo added that the foundation agrees with Vifac’s activities and is aware of reports about the tactics it employs to dissuade women and girls from having abortions. “If Vifac was working illegally, it would not exist,” she said.
Mexico’s anti-abortion movement goes deeper than Vifac alone, and is incredibly well-funded by corporate giants across the board. For many of the foundations examined by openDemocracy, championing the anti-abortion cause is central to their philanthropy – and they are willing to spend widely to achieve their aim.
Between 2017 and 2023, we found that nine of the 22 Vifac donors gave more than $1m to eight other anti-abortion organisations. These include the Centro de Ayuda para la Mujer Latinoamericana (Latin American Women's Help Centre), a network of crisis pregnancy centres operating in Mexico and throughout Latin America region, whose lies and misinformation tactics openDemocracy uncovered in 2020.
Responding to these findings, feminist activist Castro Flores said: “Vifac is just one face of the multiple branches and organisations that, following its example, have designed their own religion based programs”.
And Cardona added: “These organisations not only curtail available options for women and pregnant people but they also perpetuate a cycle of helplessness and lack of autonomy”.
* Verónica García de León contributed research and data collection for this investigation. Data visualisation by Carla Abreu
Update, 12 August 2024: This article was amended to include answers from the UN Global Compact.
