MEXICO CITY (AP) — The party of Mexico President Andrés Manuel López Obrador has continued its consolidation of power by winning four of the six governorships on ballot in local elections, according to electoral authorities.
National Regeneration Movement — known as Morena — along with its allied parties won in Tamaulipas, Quintana Roo, Oaxaca and Hidalgo on Sunday. Opposition coalitions won in Aguascalientes and Durango.
The victories gave Morena control of 22 of Mexico’s 32 states, a important advantage heading into the 2024 presidential elections.
“With 22 governorships and a well-evaluated president, everything appears to indicate that Morena shores up first place heading into the presidency in 2024,” said Patricio Morelos, a politics professor at Monterrey Tech university.
Morena holds 20 of those states outright and two others are held by allied politicians.
Of the big opposition parties, members of the conservative National Action Party govern five states.
The old ruling Institutional Revolutionary Party saw its governorships sink to three. Until 1989, it held every governorship in Mexico, marking a striking fall for the party.
The small Citizen’s Movement party holds two governorships.
López Obrador has maintained high popularity while Mexico’s opposition has floundered, steadily losing ground.
However, so much of Morena’s success is attributed to López Obrador that there are doubts about whether the party will hold together after his term ends, when he says he will retire from politics.
“It is a historic day for ‘Obradorism,’” said Mario Delgado, Morena’s president. “We continue advancing and the people keep confirming with their vote that it is an honor to be with Obrador.”
López Obrador reveled in the victories Monday, and even took the luxury of offering the lagging opposition some advice.
“They should revise their strategy,” López Obrador said. “They are being seriously affected by their classism, their racism.”
Morena is a party founded by, and for, López Obrador, and has accepted converts from other parties, so it has little internal cohesion apart from him.
The president said Monday that the race for the Morena party 2024 presidential nomination will begin soon and that the competition would be decided by a poll conducted by party officials.
Contenders have doubted the objectivity and veracity of such polls in the past, raising the possibility of angry confrontations within Morena.
Copyright © 2024 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, written or redistributed.
