General elections were held in Mexico on 1 July 2018. Voters elected a new President of Mexico to serve a term of five years and ten months (reduced by two months from the constitutional mandate due to a change in the inauguration date as of 2014), 128 members of the Senate for a period of six years and 500 members of the Chamber of Deputies for a period of three years. It was one of the largest election days in Mexican history, with most of the nation's states holding state and local elections on the same day, including nine governorships, with over 3,400 positions subject to elections all levels of government. It has been the most violent campaign Mexico has experienced in recent history, with 130 political figures killed since September 2017.
The incumbent president Enrique Peña Nieto was not constitutionally eligible for a second term. Incumbent members of the legislature are term-limited, thus all members of Congress will be newly elected. As a consequence of the political reform of 2014, the members of the legislature elected in this election will be the first allowed to run for reelection in subsequent elections. The National Electoral Institute (INE) officially declared the new process underway on 8 September 2017. The presidential election was won by Andrés Manuel López Obrador of the National Regeneration Movement (MORENA), running as the candidate of the Juntos Haremos Historia alliance. This is the first time a candidate won an outright majority according to official vote counts since 1988.
Around 30 minutes after polls closed in the country's north-west, José Antonio Meade, speaking at a news conference from PRI headquarters, conceded defeat and wished Andrés Manuel López Obrador "every success". Ricardo Anaya also conceded defeat within an hour of the polls closing, and independent candidate Jaime Rodríguez Calderón recognized López Obrador's victory shortly afterward. The results of the INE's official quick count were announced around midnight Mexico City time. It reported a turnout of around 63%, with the following approximate results for the candidates: López Obrador, 53%; Anaya, 22%; Meade, 16%; and Rodríguez Calderón, 5%. This is the first time since the (controversial) 1988 election that a presidential candidate has been elected with an absolute majority (50%+1) of the votes cast.
0 Comments