Mexico Legislative and Governor elections June 6th 2021

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The TEPJF has ruled in the INE's favour and cancelled the candidacies of Morena's gubernatorial candidates in Guerrero (Félix Salgado) and Michoacán (Raúl Morón). Legally, Morena now has 48 hours to replace both candidates.

Morena and AMLO are very pissed, with the president saying it is a 'blow to democracy' and he is sure to double down on his attacks on the INE with threat of some revenge electoral reform after the elections. LPO reports that internally, the presidency and Morena are worried that Salgado will react violently and that, in the absence of a plan B in Guerrero, AMLO allegedly doesn't want to replace Salgado. One idea which had been circulating recently is having one of Salgado's daughters replace him, and then perhaps have a 'Juanita' scenario like in Iztapalapa in 2009 (the stand-in candidate-winner resigning, being replaced by the ejected candidate).

[PSOL]

Well it’s great AMLO is being put on his toes. This will ensure more #populist goody packages in the coming months to save face.

[JM1295]

It's too bad that only a few people comment in this thread, I love Mexican politics! Governor races are starting to tighten for MORENA in Michoacan, Tlaxcala, and Zacatecas. MORENA is still looking at a strong performance though in Nayarit, Colima, Sinaloa, and Sonora and doing keeping things relatively close in BCS. MORENA is also likely to keep their legislative majority, albeit not a supermajority. Not an inherent fan of MORENA, but there is something really nice about seeing PRI get wiped out.

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Morena has formally nominated rapey Félix Salgado's daughter Evelyn Salgado as candidate in Guerrero. She was president of the municipal Integral Family Development department (DIF) when her father was mayor of Acapulco and she was 22, and she is currently delegate of the women's secretariat in Acapulco. Her candidacy was supported by her father, which led to claims of 'imposition' by her rivals in the hastily organized 'polling' conducted to determine the replacement candidacy, most notably senator Nestora Salgado (no relation). The senator questioned Evelyn Salgado's merits, her lack of experience and her lack of activism. Félix Salgado responded to claim that he wanted to impose his daughter by saying that such claims are 'gender violence against women', which I'm not sure is something you should say if you're accused of rape. She also has her own controversies: her husband is the son of Joaquín Alonso 'El Abulón' who was arrested in 2016 suspected of being a financial operator for the Beltrán Leyva cartel.

Rapey Salgado has denied that his daughter is a 'Juanita', claiming that he will return to his seat in the Senate.

[jaichind]

El Financiero poll on legislative race

On paper, PRI-PAN-PRD is almost as high as MORENA-PVEM-PT

[JM1295]

Where do you find these polls? I can usually only find Massive Caller polls.

[Ron DeSantis enthusiast]

Incredible how anyone is talking about the governor race in Nuevo Leon, the second most important state in México, one of the favorites in polls (Samuel Garcia) is talking about getting out of the agreement with the federal government to stop sending money and having full independence of their money

[PSOL]

Incredible how anyone is talking about the governor race in Nuevo Leon, the second most important state in México, one of the favorites in polls (Samuel Garcia) is talking about getting out of the agreement with the federal government to stop sending money and having full independence of their money

Morena winning has spurned the decentralization campaign again.

[Ron DeSantis enthusiast]

Incredible how anyone is talking about the governor race in Nuevo Leon, the second most important state in México, one of the favorites in polls (Samuel Garcia) is talking about getting out of the agreement with the federal government to stop sending money and having full independence of their money

Morena winning has spurned the decentralization campaign again.

Nuevo Leon has to be the state where Morena and AMLO are the most unpopular compared to other state

[jaichind]

Where do you find these polls? I can usually only find Massive Caller polls.

Due to the nature of my work I have access to various proprietary news wires that focused on world political developments.  These wires have links to various polls that are done by local media.  In theory if you search google news every day you can find these stories but these news wires does this work for you.

[Hash]

Not sure if there's any interest for actual effortposts around here, but I am working on previews of all gubernatorial races this year. Here are the first two.

Baja California

Baja California famously became, in 1989, the first state to be won by another party than the PRI, with the victory of the panista Ernesto Ruffo Appel. Baja California was a panista stronghold for 30 years – the PAN held the governorship for five successive terms, between 1989 and 2019.

In 2018, however, the PAN was annihilated in its former stronghold by Morena. AMLO won 63.9% in the state and his coalition carried all 8 federal districts. In the 2019 gubernatorial election, Jaime Bonilla (Morena), a businessman who had previously been a Republican member of the Otay Mesa water district board, was elected governor with 50% of the vote (although with turnout below 30%). Morena also won all five municipalities and a comfortable majority in the state congress.

A 2014 constitutional amendment had reduced the term of the governor elected in 2019 from six to two years, to align state elections with federal elections from 2021. Bonilla opposed this and tried to challenge the shortened term in the electoral courts. Shortly after his election, the outgoing state congress – with a PAN majority – adopted a constitutional amendment extending the gubernatorial term from two years to five years. It was said that the ley Bonilla, as the term extension was known, was part of an ‘impunity pact’ between the incoming governor and the outgoing PAN governor, Kiko Vega, who is implicated in several controversies and scandals.

This ley Bonilla was extremely controversial. The national leaderships of the PAN, PRI, PRD and MC began to expel their state deputies who had voted in favour. The issue became a nightmare for the federal government, with certain voices in Morena clearly opposed to it while AMLO tried to avoid it as best he could. In December 2019, the federal electoral court (TEPJF) ruled the amendment unconstitutional – a decision which AMLO said he ‘respected’. In May 2020, the Supreme Court (SCJN) dealt the ley Bonilla its final blow by ruling it to be unconstitutional.

There is rather widespread agreement that Bonilla has been a disastrous governor, an opinion even shared by some within his own party. The homicide rate remained extremely high (over 80 per 100,000 inhabitants in 2019 and 2020, with over 2,600 homicides), amidst narco turf wars in Tijuana. The state has been significantly more indebted, and he increased taxes. Bonilla, who has repeatedly clashed with businessmen, is now trying to expropriate without compensation the Tijuana country club to turn into a large public park.

The candidates:

Marina del Pilar (Morena-PT-PVEM): Morena’s candidate is Marina del Pilar (35 years old), the former mayor of Mexicali (2019-2021) and former federal deputy (2018-2019). She was elected mayor of Mexicali in 2019, one year after she was elected federal deputy for Baja California’s 2nd district. In 2019, she married ex-PAN state deputy Carlos Torres Torres, who was among those who pushed for the approval of the ley Bonilla, for which he was expelled from the PAN.

She won Morena’s nomination against several other candidates, notably the mayor of Ensenada Armando Ayala (supported by Bonilla) and the mayor of Tijuana and Bonilla’s enemy, Arturo González Cruz. Marina del Pilar is trying to balance the governor’s support with his relative unpopularity. Bonilla managed to secure Morena’s mayoral candidacies for his allies in Ensenada, Playas de Rosarito, Tecate and Tijuana – where the candidate is state deputy Monserrat Caballero, famous for drinking beer during a virtual session of the state congress in 2020. Arturo González Cruz, who resigned as mayor of Tijuana in February 2021, is now running for federal deputy for the PVEM.

Lupita Jones (PAN-PRI-PRD): The candidate of the opposition Va por Baja California coalition is Miss Universe 1991 María Guadalupe ‘Lupita’ Jones. Jones is the current franchise holder of the Mexicana Universal beauty pageant. In 2018, she was accused of transphobia after saying that transgender women should not compete in beauty pageants and that transgender women ‘are not the same’ She has no prior political experience and has said that she has never read a book about politics. Instead, she tries to sell herself as an independent citizen with no political baggage.

The opposition coalition had a difficult time settling on a candidate. The local PRI supported the controversial former PRI mayor of Tijuana, Jorge Hank Rhon, but much of the local PAN – most notably Ernesto Ruffo, a regular critic of his party’s leadership and strategy – was strongly opposed. In the PAN, the names of former mayor of Tijuana Héctor Osuna and senator Gina Cruz circulated. The coalition agreement, on the grounds of legal requirements for gender parity, stated that the gubernatorial candidate would be a woman. Lupita Jones was the coalition’s last-ditch compromise candidate, seen as the only candidate with which the three parties would at least stand a fighting chance.

With Lupita Jones’ candidacy (and her background as a beauty queen), there’s been no shortage of misogynistic, sexist or macho comments. Bonilla said that the election wasn’t a beauty contest, but that in any case Marina del Pilar – who he describes as very beautiful and very intelligent – would win a beauty contest. The governor also accused the PAN of wanting to ‘exploit the beauty of Lupita Jones’. Jones thanked the governor for considering that she’s still beautiful 30 years after the Miss Universe contest.

Jorge Hank Rhon (PES): Hank Rhon, a very colourful, eccentric and controversial businessman and the former PRI mayor of Tijuana (2004-2007), is running for governor for the Partido Encuentro Solidario (PES). Hank is the son of Carlos Hank González – former governor of Edomex (1969-1975), head of government of the Federal District (1976-1982) and cabinet secretary under Carlos Salinas – and considered as a ‘founder’ or ‘adopted son’ of the powerful Grupo Atlacomulco. His brother, Carlos Hank Rhon, is a billionaire and one of the wealthiest men in Mexico.

Jorge Hank settled in Tijuana and is the owner of the Grupo Caliente, which owns the Agua Caliente racetrack, a dog track, a private zoo, hotels, a chain of casinos and the city’s professional football club, Club Tijuana. In 2004, he was elected mayor of Tijuana for the PRI. He was the PRI coalition’s gubernatorial candidate in 2007, losing the election to the PAN by about 6%.

A controversial figure, Hank Rhon has been accused of ties to drug trafficking, money laundering and murder. He has been implicated in the murder of his son’s girlfriend in 2009, as well as the 1988 assassination of a critical local journalist, killed by two security guards employed by Hank’s companies. In 2011, Hank was arrested after the army found over 80 firearms and over 9,000 cartridges in one of his properties, including two guns linked to homicides. However, he was released shortly afterwards, in what was another major blow to the credibility of the Mexican judicial system.

The eccentric Hank owns hundreds of exotic animals, was detained at the airport in the 1990s for carrying items made from endangered animals in his luggage and is accused of participating in the illegal trade of endangered species.

Jorge Hank has been married four times and has 21 biological or adoptive children. His current wife is 34 years younger than him. He has a long history of sexist and misogynistic comments. Back in 2004, he said that his favourite animal was still ‘the woman’. This year, Hank complained that women had become a bit less intelligent. After that comment, he was seen attending a class on ‘gender and equal oral expression’, although it doesn’t seem to have been of much use because he recently confused femicides with ‘women becoming hitmen’.

After being rejected by the PRI and the opposition coalition, Hank tried to woo the local state party (PBC) and looked to the two new parties (FxM and RSP) before finally registering as the gubernatorial candidate for the PES. He is supported by many local PRI supporters, as well as PT (ex-Morena) senator Alejandra León Gastélum. Some in the PAN also believe that Felipe Calderón and his entourage are quietly supporting Hank.

Governor Bonilla has repeatedly attack Hank during the campaign. Earlier in April, after a video from the CJNG threatening the governor and other state officials, Bonilla accused Hank of being the leader of the cartel in the state and of being the ‘biggest criminal’ in the history of the state. In the past, Hank Rhon had also been accused of ties to the Tijuana Cartel of the Arellano Félix brothers.

Other candidates: The other candidates are former senator (2010-12) Alcibíades García (MC), Jorge Ojeda (FxM), Victoria Bentley (RSP) and Carlos Atilano for the local Party of Baja California (PBC). The PBC is an old state-level party which ran alone in 2019 but was allied with the PAN in 2013 and with the PRI in 2007. It is a centrist party with ties to the state’s business community, and it is opposed to Morena.

**

Marina del Pilar has been leading in nearly all the polls, although there have been rather few polls from reputable firms. In some polls, Hank is second of Lupita Jones, and in any case it is clear that Jones’ candidacy never took off and is stagnating.

Morena is confident that, like in 2018 and 2019, it will win everything (carro completo) – all municipalities, all 8 federal districts and a majority in the state congress. The closest mayoral race may be in Tijuana, where Morena candidate Monserrat Caballero (see above) is facing former mayor (2007-2010) Jorge Ramos (PAN-PRI-PRD).

The PES candidate was supposed to be retired lieutenant colonel Julián Leyzaola, the controversial former police chief of Tijuana in the early 2000s – credited with ‘cleaning up’ the city from high criminality and drug trafficking – and later police chief in Juárez later in the 2010s. Leyzaola has been facing accusations of torture for over 7 years. He ran in the last two mayoral elections in Tijuana, in 2016 (for the PES) and in 2019 (for the PRD), finishing second both times. Upon seeking to obtain proof of residency for his candidacy this year, Leyzaola was informed that there is an arrest warrant (from state prosecutors) for torture against him and he is currently a fugitive. The PES attempted to register his candidacy, but his registration was unsurprisingly rejected. He was ultimately replaced by his daughter Indira. It's unclear if this is a 'Juanito' scenario, and where it leaves rumours that there were attempts at consolidating split-ticket voting (voto cruzado) between Hank and Ramos. Jorge Ramos has publicly defended Leyzaola, saying that he shouldn’t be facing charges and the government should be going after criminals. This would suggest that he was looking to get Hank and the PES to agree to a voto cruzado between the two.


Baja California Sur

The PRI lost the sparsely populated state in 1999, to the PRD, which held it for two successive terms (1999-2005, 2005-2011), before losing to the PAN which has now governed BCS for two successive terms (2011-2015, 2015-2021). The incumbent governor is Carlos Mendoza Davis (PAN), elected in 2015.

In 2018, AMLO won 64% in BCS and his coalition won both of the state’s lower house single-member districts. Morena also won a majority in the state congress and 3 of the 5 municipalities, including the state capital La Paz and the resort towns of Los Cabos.
However, this year, the PAN is favoured to retain the governorship. The candidate of the Unidos contigo coalition – PAN, PRI, PRD and two local parties (PHBCS, PRS) – is Francisco ‘Pancho’ Pelayo (PAN). Pelayo is the nephew of former PAN governor Marcos Alberto Covarrubias (2011-2015). He was federal deputy between 2012 and 2015, and mayor of Comondú between 2015 and 2018.

The Morena-PT candidate is Víctor Manuel Castro. Castro, elected to the Senate in 2018, had been serving since AMLO’s inauguration as the federal government’s superdelegate, or ‘state coordinator for social programs’, a controversial position created by AMLO officially to coordinate delivery of social programs in the states. Castro is a veteran politician and trade unionist, and a founding member of Morena in 2014. He served as state education secretary (2002-2004), mayor of La Paz (2005-2008) and federal deputy (2009-2012). He was Morena’s gubernatorial candidate in 2015, finishing fourth with 6.4%. His nomination, announced in December 2020, was poorly received by at least two of the other pre-candidates: Alejandro Lage, who is running for a new local party, and the mayor of La Paz, Rubén Muñoz Álvarez, who reportedly shouted and stormed out of the meeting when Castro’s nomination was confirmed.

The PVEM candidate is the ex-Morena mayor of Los Cabos Armida Castro Guzmán, who left Morena in March 2021. There are 7 other candidates including Adonai Carreón (PES) and Andrea Marcela Geiger (MC).

All polls in April have had the PAN’s candidate, Pelayo, ahead – either narrowly or more comfortably – of Castro.

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Campeche

Campeche, the leading oil producing state in Mexico, is one of the few remaining states which has always been governed by the PRI. The former governor (2015-2019), Alejandro ‘Alito’ Moreno, has been national leader of the PRI since 2019. His main advantage in winning the leadership was, besides the support of PRI governors, his existing electoral structure and strength, so he will be under intense pressure to prove that he can retain his state in priista hands.

In 2018, AMLO won 61.2% in Campeche.

Moreno is said to have conditioned a national coalition with the PAN and PRD to the imposition of his candidate in Campeche, and the withdrawal of the PAN’s putative candidate. Over the local opposition of the PAN, the coalition was formed, and its candidate is Moreno’s nephew, Christian Castro, state secretary of social development since 2019. Castro owes his political career to Alito Moreno, and this attempt at nepotistic dynastic succession may explain why the PRI’s candidate is struggling in the polls.

The PAN’s original candidate (in coalition with MC), sacrificed by his party for the sake of the alliance with the PRI, was Eliseo Fernández, mayor of Campeche (the state capital) since 2018, somewhat well regarded as mayor though he did promote hydroxychloroquine during the pandemic. Fernández is now running for the MC. Fernández says that he supports AMLO and the ‘fourth transformation’ (4T), and he promises a ‘total change’ – claiming both of his main opponents are linked to the PRI.

The Morena-PT coalition’s candidate is Layda Sansores, former mayor of Álvaro Obregón in CDMX (2018-2012), former senator (1994-2000, 2012-2018) and former federal deputy (1991-1994, 2006-2009). She is the daughter of former PRI governor Carlos Sansores Pérez (1967-1973), a close ally of President Luis Echeverría who later went on to serve as national leader of the PRI (1976-1979). She already unsuccessfully ran for governor in 1997 (for the PRD, 41%), 2003 (for Convergencia, now MC, 14%) and 2015 (for Morena, 17.8%). In 2018, while she was senator, the media revealed that she charged about 700,000 pesos in expenses unrelated to her legislative work (dolls, pillows, appliances, food, clothing, hair dye etc.). She won the Morena nomination against senator Rocío Abreu, elected in 2018 for the PRI-PANAL but who defected shortly thereafter to Morena.

Sansores, who is fairly unpopular, was criticized for her poor record in Álvaro Obregón in CDMX and for leaving that office to run for governor in another state. Her opponents in the state claim that the real ‘owner’ of Morena in Campeche is former PRI governor Fernando Ortega Bernés (2009-2015).

Morena’s mayoral candidate in Campeche is Renato Sales, former state prosecutor (2009-2013) and national security commissioner under EPN (2015-2018). An effective public servant, he is one of the few EPN-era public servants well regarded by the 4T – he was, after all, sub-prosecutor in the DF when AMLO was head of government there.

Once again, the real state of affairs is muddied by the proliferation of very prolific pollsters with limited track records or proven credibility, but Sansores seems to have lost her early advantage with polls showing a close three-way race between Fernández (MC), Castro (PRI) and Sansores. The PRI is clearly very worried about this: Rubén Moreira, the former governor of Coahuila who is seen as the PRI’s best electoral operator, has been dispatched to Campeche to organize the fight.

[Socani]

I think the accident in the 12th Metro line ended the political careers of both Ebrard and Sheinbaum respecting to the average person, Sheinbaum is trying to blame Mancera with the typical ''ThE PaSt GoVeRnMeNt CaUsEd AlL tHe FaIlUrEs'' but it isn't sticking with the General Public.

[jaichind]

In Guerrero, after MORENA swapped out Félix Salgado and swapped in his daughter Evelyn Salgado, MORENA still seems to be ahead

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Chihuahua

The largest state in Mexico, Chihuahua was among the PAN’s first strongholds, winning major local victories from the early 1980s. The contested (rigged) 1986 gubernatorial election, and the PAN’s protests afterwards, marked a turning point in post-electoral mobilizations in Mexico and presaged the opposition protests after the 1988 elections. The PAN gained Chihuahua in 1992, its second formal electoral victory after BC*, but the PRI regained the state in 1998 – and held it in 2004 and 2010. The PAN regained the state in 2016, with the victory of former senator Javier Corral with 39.7% of the vote against 30.7% for the PRI.

AMLO won the state with 43.1% in 2018, against 28.5% for Anaya (PAN-PRD-MC) and 16.1% for Meade (PRI-PVEM-PANAL).

The PRI governor between 2010 and 2016 was the infamously corrupt César Duarte. Duarte was already controversial during his term for accusations of corruption and nepotism and leaving behind one of the most deeply indebted states in Mexico. After leaving office, he fled the country to the US, escaping accusations of embezzling over 275 million pesos.

Javier Corral’s administration opened nearly 40 criminal investigations into Duarte and his clientelist networks and issued several arrest warrants against the former governor. Corral accused the Peña Nieto administration of dragging its feet in requesting Duarte’s extradition and complained of alleged reprisals by the federal government for his prosecutor’s investigations. In January 2018, the federal government finally requested Duarte’s extradition for all the crimes of which he is accused. In July 2020, Duarte was arrested in Miami – coincidentally while AMLO was visiting Trump in Washington.

Javier Corral has long been critical of his party’s leadership and hasn’t minced his words when it comes to certain panistas, most notably Felipe Calderón. There have been persistent rumours for some time that he has explored launching his own party, and he has presidential ambitions in 2024. Since 2018, he has been one of the most prominent opposition governors. He is a member of the Federalist Alliance – a grouping of 10 opposition governors which has clashed with AMLO on the management of the pandemic and demanded a revision of federal transfers to the states. In September 2020, the Federalist Alliance governors also quit the National Governors’ Conference (CONAGO).

In 2020, local water conflicts erupted with farmers – backed by Corral – occupying La Boquilla dam. Under the 1944 water treaty with the US, Mexico must send some water from the Rio Grande and its tributaries to the US, and Mexico was behind on its obligations and needed to release water from dams in Chihuahua. However, after one of the driest years in 3 decades, local farmers and Corral said that there would not be enough water for agriculture. Tensions escalated in September 2020, as farmers seized the dam, closed the valves and fought with the National Guard, resulting in the death of two farmers, presumably killed by the National Guard. AMLO accused Corral, other local politicians and big agriculture ‘mafias’ of hoarding water, fomenting strife and using the water conflict for political purposes, endangering relations with the US. Corral denied AMLO’s accusations, saying the president was being dishonest and sowing hatred.

In 2017, investigations discovered that Duarte maintained a large ‘secret payroll’ through which he bribed over 100 people including PRI and opposition politicians, journalists, activists, businessmen and religious figures. Among them, according to Corral, were certain panistas including the two-term mayor of Chihuahua (the state capital) and gubernatorial hopeful, María Eugenia ‘Maru’ Campos. The state prosecutor’s office opened an investigation against her last summer.

Campos claimed that the investigation was political persecution by Corral and believed that he wanted to imprison her to destroy her gubernatorial candidacy, and favour of that of his ally, senator Gustavo Madero. One of her assistants accused Corral’s attorney general of “fabricating accusations and evidence” and pressuring a star witness to testify. Maru Campos won a landslide victory in the PAN’s internal primary in January, winning 61.9% against 37.5% for Madero. Her victory was a major blow to Corral (and his presidential ambitions), who had tried to stop her at all costs – but in doing so, he may have ended up victimizing her, and allowing her to rally all of his enemies and rivals within the party around her.

María Eugenia ‘Maru’ Campos is the PAN-PRD’s candidate. She has also been endorsed by Calderón. Corral remains furious with the results and has continued to publicly denounce Campos’ ties to Duarte and accuse the PAN leadership of protecting obvious cases of corruption. He has also criticized the PAN’s alliance with the PRI nationally, claiming that the PAN has abandoned its values and principles.

In early April, a judge charged Maru Campos with bribery, accused of receiving 10.3 million pesos from Duarte’s secret payroll between 2014 and 2016, when she was a PAN state deputy. The judge accepted the evidence (receipts) presented by the state prosecutor and her defence was unable to prove that the receipts were false. Campos stated that her political rights as a candidate were not affected, and the PAN and PRD’s leaderships closed ranks behind her. Campos and her allies have claimed that Corral is supporting Morena, which he denies.

The Morena-PT-PANAL candidate is federal deputy Juan Carlos Loera, former federal ‘superdelegate’ in the state (2018-2020). Loera is under investigation for ‘premature campaigning’ – accused of using his office as superdelegate to promote his image through personalized cards with the logo the Secretariat of Welfare and conditioning social programs to electoral support for him in 2021.

Loera was selected as Morena’s candidate over senator Cruz Pérez Cuéllar – a former PAN federal deputy and MC gubernatorial candidate in 2016. Pérez Cuéllar got the mayoral candidate in Juárez as a consolation prize. Pérez Cuéllar is among the alleged beneficiaries of Duarte’s secret payroll with 2.5 million pesos received between 2013 and 2015, money which was used to fund his 2016 gubernatorial campaign. In December 2020, the state prosecutors requested his desafuero and issued an arrest warrant, but in late April 2021, federal deputies rejected his desafuero.

Despite all of this (and the fact that the state PT was a long-time ally of the PRI and Duarte (as recently as 2016) and that the outgoing independent mayor of Juárez, Armando Cabada, now Morena ‘pluri’ congressional candidate) Loera and Morena reacted to Campos’ indictment by branding her part of the corruptos de siempre (same old corrupt bunch) and preaching about honest government.

The PRI’s candidate is former senator Graciela Ortiz González. Ortiz was secretary-general of the state government under Duarte (2010-2012) and later secretary-general of the PRI. She is also implicated in the secret payroll scandal, but no charges seem to have been filed against her.

Corral may be supporting the MC’s candidate, Alfredo Lozoya, mayor of Hidalgo del Parral. The MC’s mayoral candidate in Chihuahua, Campos’ home base, is ex-PAN federal deputy Miguel Riggs, a known ally of the governor.

Other candidates are Brenda Ríos (PVEM), Luis Carlos Arrieta (PES), María Eugenia Baeza (RSP) and Alejandro Díaz (FxM).

The election is expected to be tight, but Maru Campos has a narrow advantage in nearly all polls. A recent poll published in El Financiero had her leading Loera by 6 points, 40% to 36%.

* A panista was elected interim governor of Guanajuato by the state congress in 1991, following a controversial election and PRI-PAN negotiations at the highest level in the capital.

[JM1295]

Interesting that you cover Chihuahua today, given a new Massive Caller poll came out today showing Morena leading for the first time. I can see this being an upset in favor of Morena given the tight margins and how good Morena has been with voter outreach. Great writeups btw! They're really good reads.

[jaichind]

Interesting that you cover Chihuahua today, given a new Massive Caller poll came out today showing Morena leading for the first time. I can see this being an upset in favor of Morena given the tight margins and how good Morena has been with voter outreach. Great writeups btw! They're really good reads.

Other recent polls also show MORENA pulling slightly ahead

[jaichind]

https://www.reuters.com/world/americas/mexicos-president-backs-probe-opposition-governor-candidates-2021-05-11/

"Mexico’s president backs probe of opposition governor candidates"

AMLO looking to strike back after MORENA had their governor candidates in Guerrero and Michoacán removed and had to be replaced.

[jaichind]

I think the accident in the 12th Metro line ended the political careers of both Ebrard and Sheinbaum respecting to the average person, Sheinbaum is trying to blame Mancera with the typical ''ThE PaSt GoVeRnMeNt CaUsEd AlL tHe FaIlUrEs'' but it isn't sticking with the General Public.

That's a pretty big blow for MORENA.  Are not Sheinbaum and Ebrard precisely the people talked about as the successors to AMLO in MORENA after 2024 ?

[JM1295]

I think the accident in the 12th Metro line ended the political careers of both Ebrard and Sheinbaum respecting to the average person, Sheinbaum is trying to blame Mancera with the typical ''ThE PaSt GoVeRnMeNt CaUsEd AlL tHe FaIlUrEs'' but it isn't sticking with the General Public.

That's a pretty big blow for MORENA.  Are not Sheinbaum and Ebrard precisely the people talked about as the successors to AMLO in MORENA after 2024 ?

Yeah Sheinbaum in particular in seen as his disciple and who AMLO would back over everyone else. I'm not sure if this will be significant enough to sink them, given that they still have 3 years to turn things around. It isn't great obviously though.

[jaichind]

I think the accident in the 12th Metro line ended the political careers of both Ebrard and Sheinbaum respecting to the average person, Sheinbaum is trying to blame Mancera with the typical ''ThE PaSt GoVeRnMeNt CaUsEd AlL tHe FaIlUrEs'' but it isn't sticking with the General Public.

That's a pretty big blow for MORENA.  Are not Sheinbaum and Ebrard precisely the people talked about as the successors to AMLO in MORENA after 2024 ?

Yeah Sheinbaum in particular in seen as his disciple and who AMLO would back over everyone else. I'm not sure if this will be significant enough to sink them, given that they still have 3 years to turn things around. It isn't great obviously though.

https://www.elfinanciero.com.mx/nacional/2021/05/12/cae-22-puntos-la-aprobacion-de-sheinbaum-tras-colapso-de-linea-12/

The approval rating of Mexico City Mayor Claudia Sheinbaum dropped 22%  following the collapse of an elevated metro line in the capital that killed 26 people, daily El Financiero reported on Wednesday.

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Colima

The least populated state in the union, Colima is another of the few remaining members of the ‘always PRI’ club – states that have always had PRI governors. Although that may very well change this year.

The incumbent governor is José Ignacio ‘Nacho’ Peralta (PRI), elected in a special election in 2016 after the TEPJF cancelled the 2015 election. The 2015 election was cancelled after the PAN, which had lost by less than 0.2%, denounced a video in which the secretary of social development was seeking votes for Peralta from the state’s public administration. Peralta won the 2016 rematch by a wider margin against PAN senator Jorge Luis Preciado.

‘Nacho’ Peralta is a member of the opposition governors’ Federalist Alliance. Under his administration, Colima has suffered from a wave of violence and it had the highest homicide rate of any state in 2019, and the second highest in 2020. Peralta is one of the least popular governors in Mexico.

AMLO won a clear victory in the state in 2020, with nearly 58%.

The candidate to beat is Morena’s Indira Vizcaíno, former federal superdelegate in Colima (2018-2020). Vizcaíno is only 34 but has already been PRD federal deputy (2009-2012), mayor of Cuauhtémoc (2012-2015), state secretary of social development (2016-2017) and federal deputy (2018). In 2016, she worked for Peralta’s gubernatorial campaign. Vizcaíno has been linked to former PRI senator and incumbent PRI state deputy Rogelio Rueda Sánchez, and several former priistas are among Morena’s local candidates.

The PT and PVEM are running separately, each with their own candidates – Aurora Díaz for the PT, which had initially wanted senator Joel Padilla Peña as their candidate; and former panista mayor of Manzanillo and former PVEM federal deputy Virgilio Mendoza for the PVEM. In addition, despite AMLO’s efforts to mediate, FxM – a new party owned by former Morena senator Pedro Haces – is running ex-Morena federal deputy Claudia Yáñez, who had quit Morena after losing the gubernatorial nomination in a selection process she considered a ‘farce’. Claudia Yáñez is the sister of César Yáñez, a longtime ally of the president who is currently a member of the presidential office.

To defeat Morena, traditional rivals – the PAN and the PRI (as well as the very much irrelevant PRD) – have formed a coalition, like elsewhere. They understood that it’s their best chance to save some political offices for the various PRI and PAN factions. The coalition’s candidate is Mely Romero Celis, who was one of the young faces of EPN’s ‘new PRI’ – she was senator (2012-2016) and undersecretary for rural development in EPN’s cabinet (2016-2018). She is from the local PRI faction led by former governor Fernando Moreno Peña (1997-2003).

The PAN’s gubernatorial candidate in 2015 and 2016, Preciado, is now running for mayor of Manzanillo, the state’s largest municipality, against a Morena incumbent who said in a campaign event that Preciado should be stoned. The sister-in-law of outgoing governor ‘Nacho’ Peralta is the mayoral candidate in Colima, the state capital.

The third candidate with a fighting chance is the MC’s Leoncio ‘Locho’ Morán – two-time mayor of Colima (2003-2006, 2018-2021), PAN gubernatorial candidate in 2005 (second with 47.6%) and MC gubernatorial candidate in 2015 and 2016 (third with 11.9% and 12.1%). In 2018, he was elected mayor of the state capital for MC. Morán’s campaign is targeting Indira Vizcaíno, whom he calls the ‘candidate of the PRI disguised as Morena’ and the ‘candidate of corruption’.

Vizcaíno is the favourite, leading nearly every single poll, although her lead may have narrowed recently. The latest poll from El Financiero showed her leading Romero by 9, 37% to 28%, with Morán third with 17%. In their previous poll, in April, Vizcaíno was up by 15.

[jaichind]

Massive Caller Congressional poll has pro-AMLO block falling short of majority based on opposition consolidation of PAN-PRI-PRD alliance




The alliances are not in place everywhere but in terms of vote share

MORENA-PVEM-PT 44.1%
PAN-PRI-PRD        46.0%

[AussieB]

How come PRI is now allied with PAN?

[Hash]

How come PRI is now allied with PAN?

Because the three old parties - weakened, discredited, divided and directionless - realized that they needed to form coalitions in order to have a chance at defeating, or more realistically, weakening and limiting the strength of Morena & friends in the congressional election and in most state/local elections. The PRI, PAN and PRD all share a common interest in opposing AMLO and his coalition, and this common interest far outweighs any historical enmity between those parties.

When the PRI was the party to beat (until 2018 or earlier), the PAN and PRD were often allied. Now that Morena is the new party to beat, then the old parties have interest in working together.

Of course that doesn't mean that there was no internal resistance to this stitch-up. AMLO got elected in a landslide by attacking the 'PRIAN', so perhaps actually forming a real 'PRIAN' (+ increasingly moribund PRD) is maybe not the best idea to fighting off perceptions that all the old parties are the mafia del poder. But the leadership of the PRI, PAN and PRD are (a) not very smart, (b) opportunistic and (c) very much motivated by saving their own personal interests and saving as many elected sinecures as possible.