New distributional records for Mexican Cleridae (Coleoptera) with the description of three new species

New state records for 32 species of Mexican Cleridae (Coleoptera) are presented. In addition, 10 species of Cleridae are reported for Mexico for the first time (new country records). Cymatodera bezarki new species and Enoclerus sepultura new species are described from Chiapas, Mexico. Enoclerus primulus new species is described from Chiapas, Mexico and El Salvador. Approximately 550 species of Cleridae are known from Mexico. These are divided among approximately 63 gen­era, of which the most speciose are Cymatodera Gray (ca. 110 species), Enoclerus Gahan (ca. 105 species) and Phyllobaenus Dejean (ca. 40 species). Faunistic studies are limited to Vaurie’s (1952) review of Cleridae collected during a single expedition to north central Mexico, a more systematic report on the Cleridae of a natural preserve in Morelos state (Toledo-Hernández et al. 2015), a survey of the Cleridae of Tamaulipas (Hernández-May et al. 2021), and several new records for Enoclerus in Mexico (Rifkind 1997). Beyond these small studies, our knowledge of Mexican checkered beetle distribution and biogeography comes primarily from localities cited in descriptions and revisionary treatments of various taxa, and in Corporaal’s (1950) catalogue. In order to establish a baseline for Mexican clerid distribution, I have aggregated (unpublished database) country and state records for Cleridae presented in the historical literature (Castelnau, Chevrolat, Gorham, Klug, Wolcott, et al.) as well as in the publica­tions of more recent workers (e. g., Vaurie 1952; Ekis 1977; Barr 1978, 2005; Opitz 2005, 2013; Burke 2013; Rifkind 2017a, 2017b). This paper presents new state records (n = 32) and new country records (n = 10) which were derived from label data of specimens sent to me for identification, as well as specimens I have collected personally. Despite much recent taxonomic work, our understanding of the extent and diversity of Mexican clerid fauna remains incomplete. Many clerid species are rarely collected, and even favored collecting sites, visited by entomolo­gists for decades, continue to produce new taxa. Other areas are largely unexplored entomologically. Recent collecting in Chiapas produced single specimens of two distinctive new clerid species, described below. Cymatodera bezarki new species was collected in the well-known (and often collected) Parque Nacional Cañon del Sumidero, which lies on the outskirts of Chiapas’ capital city Tuxtla Gutierrez, whereas Enoclerus sepultura new species was collected in the Reserva de la Biosfera La Sepultura, which is situated on the northwestern edge of the Sierra Madre of Chiapas. Although the Sierra Madre of Chiapas is a diversity hotspot (Johnson et al. 2015), it remains all but unstudied for Cleri­dae. Enoclerus primulus new species, known from Cañon del Sumidero as well as Bosque el Imposible in El Salvador, is also described herein