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By Chris Covert
Rantburg.com
Mexican voters awarded Partido Revolucionario Institucional (PRI) and their allies in the Partido Verde Ecologista Mexicano (PVEM) not only with the presidency but also claiming five of six statehouses up for election, according to data supplied by Mexican official and news accounts.
Enrique Pena Nieto ended the mystery as to who would become the next occupant of Los Pinos Monday by winning 18,449,877 votes or 38.08 percent of the total, while his closest rival Partido Revolucion Democratica/Partido Trabajo (PRD)(PT) candidate Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador came in second with 15,351,692 votes or 31.08 percent of the total.
Throughout the three month campaign Lopez Obrador and Partido Accion Nacional (PAN) candidate Josefina Vazquez Mota claimed their internal polling placed their respective candidacies within a few percentage points of Pena Nieto even as Pena Nieto racked up, week in and week out, a double digit lead over his rivals.
At very few moments in the campaign did private polling organizations change the numbers with regard to Pena Nieto's huge advantage in voters preferences. At least two private polls conducted by Mexican newspapers had Lopez Obrador within as few as four points of Pena Nieto, but down the stretch, it was Pena Nieto who became the candidate to beat.
Six state governors were up for election in Jalisco, Guanajuato, Morelos, Tabasco, Chiapas and Yucatan. Of those six, PAN only managed to retain Guanajuato. PAN previously held Jalisco, Guanajuato and Morelos states before the election. PRD had held Chiapas, but lost it to PRI.
In Jalisco state, PAN managed to capture only five seats in the local chamber of deputies to 15 PRI and PRI coalitions, and held on to 22 municipal seats while PRI won or retained 86 municipal seats. PRD managed to win or retain just 13 municipal seats. Those losses hark back to 2011 when PRI similarly crushed both PAN and PRD in Mexico and Coahuila states.
Most telling for the future of Mexican national politics has been the leftward shift in the composition of the national Chamber of Deputies. The current make up of the assembly was PRI/PVEM with 262 seats, PAN with 142, and PRD/PT/Movimiento Cuidadano (MC) with 99 seats.
Now the composition has shifted leftward still with PRI/PVEM retaining 232 seats, PRD/PT/MC with 140 and PAN with 118 seats. While the shift is clearly leftward, Mexican voters appear to like the idea of Mexico's left and right combining to pass reforms and keeping a newly invigorated PRI in check. Despite the gain in seats and the popularity of Pena Nieto, PRI has failed to gain a majority in the Chamber of Deputies.
In the Mexican senate, the shift is far less to the left but leftward nevertheless. PAN lost nine seats going from 50 to 41 seats, while PRI/PVEM gained from 41 to 57 seats, with PRD/PT/MC losing, going from 41 to 33 seats.
Chris Covert writes Mexican Drug War and national political news for Rantburg.com