After a month of street protests and a petition that gathered more than 440,000 signatures, Baja California Sur Governor Víctor Manuel Castro agreed on Wednesday to formally ask President Claudia Sheinbaum to cancel an April 10 decree that converted the small port of Loreto into a deep-sea cabotage hub. The governor and Loreto Mayor Paz Ochoa will co-sign the repeal request. But the decree remains in effect, and the coalition that forced the reversal says it will keep pressure on until the cancellation appears in the Diario Oficial, Mexico’s federal register.
The April 10 Loreto Port Decree Opened the Door to Cruise Ships
Sheinbaum’s decree amended two federal laws, the Federal Public Administration Law and the Ports Law, to reclassify Loreto as a deep-sea cabotage port. In practical terms, that designation would have authorized international vessels, including cruise ships and fuel tankers, to dock at Loreto. It also would have opened the port to expanded foreign trade operations: cargo transit, passenger disembarkation, and fuel transport.
For a town of roughly 20,000 people, those changes would have required significant infrastructure. Deep-sea cabotage ports in Mexico typically need dredged channels, reinforced piers, fueling depots, customs facilities, and passenger terminals. Loreto’s current port handles small fishing boats, private yachts, and the ferry-style pangas that carry tourists to Isla del Carmen and Isla Coronados. It has none of the infrastructure a cruise terminal demands.
The comparison that alarmed residents was Cozumel. That island off the Yucatán coast receives roughly 1,200 cruise ship calls per year and more than 4 million cruise passengers annually. Cozumel’s reefs have suffered documented coral damage from anchor chains, propeller wash, and wastewater discharge. Loreto Bay National Park, which surrounds the port, was designated a protected natural area in 1996 and became a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 2005 as part of the “Islands and Protected Areas of the Gulf of California” listing. The park’s 2019 management program explicitly restricts heavy maritime traffic in its waters.
Loreto also holds the Pueblo Mágico designation, a federal tourism label awarded to towns that preserve cultural heritage and promote low-impact tourism. Mexico’s roughly 180 Pueblo Mágico communities receive federal marketing support in exchange for maintaining their traditional character. Cruise terminals, fuel depots, and cargo infrastructure would contradict the terms of that designation.
Blue Whale Habitat and the Eco-Tourism Economy at Stake
The coalition leading the opposition, “Whales or Gas?” (“¿Ballenas o Gas?”), takes its name from the two perceived threats: cruise ship traffic and fuel transport. The group comprises more than 40 civil society and environmental organizations. CEMDA, the Mexican Center for Environmental Law, issued a formal statement warning that the decree “gravely endangers the habitat of the blue whale and the local economies that depend on the arrival and presence of the world’s largest animal.”
Blue whales migrate into the waters around Loreto Bay between January and March each year. The Sea of Cortez population, estimated at several hundred individuals, is one of the most accessible blue whale groups in the world. That accessibility supports a local eco-tourism economy built on whale watching, snorkeling, kayaking, and sport fishing. Tour operators in Loreto run small-boat excursions with groups of six to twelve passengers, a model designed to minimize disturbance to marine life.
Loreto Bay is also home to fin whales, bottlenose dolphins, sea turtles, whale sharks, and several protected bird species on the park’s islands. Environmentalists argued that large-vessel traffic, with its noise pollution, collision risk, and ballast water discharge, would disrupt feeding and breeding patterns across the park’s ecosystem.
The Navy Ministry, known as SEMAR, proposed modifying the decree rather than canceling it outright. The modifications would have limited vessel size or restricted certain zones. But the “Whales or Gas?” coalition rejected the compromise. Protesters told state officials that only a full repeal was acceptable, and after weeks of rallies in Loreto and La Paz, Governor Castro agreed.
Repeal Petition Now Heads to the President
The petition that Castro and Ochoa will co-sign states: “By decision of the community assembly in defense of the Loreto Bay National Park, I hereby express my commitment to preserve the Natural Protected Area and support the request for the repeal of the decree.” The Change.org version of the petition had passed 440,000 signatures by Tuesday.
If you own property in Loreto or visit for whale season, the stakes are direct. A deep-sea port designation would have reshaped the town’s waterfront, increased marine traffic in waters where small tour boats now operate, and potentially undermined the environmental protections that make Loreto’s coastline distinct from more developed Baja destinations like Cabo San Lucas.
The governor’s agreement to petition Sheinbaum does not guarantee a repeal. The decree was issued by presidential order and can only be reversed by presidential order. No timeline for a response from the federal government has been announced. Protesters say they will maintain their mobilization until the cancellation is published in the Diario Oficial. Reporting from Milenio, El Sudcaliforniano, and CEMDA contributed to this article.