Four keys to understanding the biggest elections in the history of Mexico

Mexico faces the last days of the electoral campaign, which ends this Wednesday to give way to a period of reflection, with an eye on the result of the polls next Sunday, June 2, in the largest elections in the history of the country.

These are the keys to the elections that will enthrone the future tenant or, presumably, tenant of the National Palace to succeed the current president, Andrés Manuel López Obrador, but also numerous public positions throughout Mexico.

The biggest elections

The elections that will be held this Sunday will be the largest in the history of Mexico because more than 97 million people are called to the polls to renew, at the federal level alone, more than 20,000 positions, including the Presidency of the Republic, the 500 seats in the Chamber of Deputies and the 128 in the Senate.

At the regional level, Mexico City, the states of Chiapas (south), Guanajuato (center), Jalisco (west), Morelos (center), Puebla (center), Tabasco (south), Veracruz (south) and Yucatán ( south) will renew the heads of their Governorships and all the municipalities their organizations.

Six years of López Obrador

With this election, López Obrador puts an end to six years of Government after winning the 2018 election with more than 30 million votes (53.2%) and after having tried to reach the National Palace on two previous occasions, in 2006 and 2012.

His six-year term, which began shortly before the outbreak of the pandemic, is marked by the increase in the migratory flow and its influence on relations with the United States, as well as the wave of violence and the debate about the power of organized crime.

One of the most representative events were the two arrests of drug trafficker Ovidio Guzmán. First, in 2019, when he was captured and released just hours later due to the violence unleashed in Sinaloa. And then, in 2023, when he was arrested again and finally extradited to the United States.

Three candidates, one future president

Citizens will find three options on the ballots: that of the ruling party, headed by Claudia Sheinbaum, former head of Government of Mexico City; that of the opposition front Fuerza y ​​Corazón por México, led by former senator Xóchitl Gálvez, and that of the also opposition Citizen Movement (MC), with the federal deputy on leave Jorge Álvarez Máynez at the helm.

According to the Oraculus portal, Sheinbaum leads the polls (average of 55%) followed by Gálvez (33%) and in a third and distant place Máynez (8%). For this reason, and for the first time after many failed attempts in the past, it is more than likely that a woman will be president of Mexico.

Violence, also in the campaign

The attacks and murders of candidates for public office have marked the pre-campaign and the campaign, since, according to data from the federal government, 15 candidates have died since October; The organization Data Cívica raises the figure, for all of 2024, to 26 and the consulting firm DataInt, which starts in July 2023, to 38.

In the recent meeting held by the Security Cabinet, the National Electoral Institute (INE) and the Mexican Army, 532 requests for protection were notified and the institutions committed to ensuring “an electoral process in peace, freedom and harmony”, in the words of the Secretary of the Interior, Luisa María Alcalde.

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