Irma Juan Carlos

Irma Juan Carlos was born on 19 July 1977 in Santiago Jocotepec, in the Papaloapan region of the state of Oaxaca. A member of the Chinantec Indigenous people,^[1] she holds a degree in biology from the Instituto Tecnológico de la Cuenca del Papaloapan in Tuxtepec (2002) and a master's in tropical forest management and conservation from the Centro Agronómico Tropical de Investigación y Enseñanza in Costa Rica (2005).^[2][3]

Her political activism began in 2000 when she worked for the 2000 presidential campaign of Cuauhtémoc Cárdenas (PRD). She was later a national delegate of the PRD in Oaxaca and a member of the party's state council. By 2012 she had switched allegiance to Morena; in 2013–2018 she was one of the party's state council members, including a period as the council's president in 2016–2018.^[2]

In the 2018 general election she was elected to the Chamber of Deputies for Oaxaca's 2nd district for the first time,^[4] and she was re-elected to subsequent terms in the 2021 mid-terms and the 2024 general election.^[5][6] During her 2018–2021 and 2021–2024 periods in Congress, she chaired the lower house's Committee on Indigenous and Afro-Mexican Peoples.^[7][8] She also represented the lower house on the board of the National Institute of Indigenous Peoples (INPI) in 2020.^[2]

In 2021, Juan Carlos contended for Morena's nomination to compete in the 2022 gubernatorial election in Oaxaca. She made it to the final stages of the process^[9] but ultimately lost to Salomón Jara Cruz, who went on to win the 5 June 2022 election.^[10][11]

In April 2025, she was among a group of Morena deputies who demanded the dismissal of Secretary of Welfare Ariadna Montiel Reyes on account of her "despotic attitude" and alleged acts of corruption within her department.^[12]