As anticipated, Mexicans returned the presidency to the PRI on July 1. Enrique Peña Nieto, the
nominee of the PRI and the Green Party, sailed to victory over the PRD and PAN
candidates: with 95% of votes counted, Peña won 38.1% to AMLO’s 31.7% and
Vasquez Mota’s 25.4%.
What’s worth
mentioning about the results? For one, Peña’s margin was much smaller than the
daily polls published by El Universal newspaper in conjunction with the
reputable survey firm GEA-ISA projected. The final poll before the elections
gave Peña 46.9% of the vote, 9.2 percentage points more than he actually
received. The 14-16 percentage point margin Peña enjoyed in the polls earlier
in the campaign eroded to just 6.3 points on July 1. So, although Peña won
comfortably, his victory wasn’t the landslide that had been anticipated.
Neither did the
PRI win control of Congress. Although the PRI and its coalition partner, the
Green Party will hold more seats than any other party or coalition on both
chambers of Congress, they will not hold a majority in either house.
Including the
seats won by its Green allies, the PRI-Green’s 232 seats fell well short of the
251 seats required for an absolute majority in the Chamber of Deputies. In
fact, the coalition won fewer seats than the 239 the PRI alone held in the
previous legislature. The two parties’ seat total fell by 30. The 2014 election
could give Mr. Peña an absolute majority in the Chamber of Deputies but, for
the next two years, he will have to look for the votes he needs to pass
legislation from other parties. Even if Peña can bring along all ten of the
Panal’s deputies, he will still have to get some of the votes he needs for a majority
from the PAN or the PRD.
In the Senate, the
PRI-Green alliance did better. They are expected to win 57 of the chamber’s 128
seats, 16 more than in the previous legislature. Unlike the US where a third of
the Senate is elected every two years, in Mexico all senators’ terms run the
same six years as the presidential sexenio.
The July 1 voting means that unless the new president can persuade some
senators to change parties, he will never have a majority in the Senate. And,
the senators whose votes he needs will have to come from the PRD or PAN.
Voters left no
doubt they are disillusioned with the PAN. Their presidential candidate, who garnered
only a quarter of the vote, was almost as far behind the second place AMLO as
AMLO was behind Peña. In the Chamber, the PAN also finished third, behind the
PRD and its Worker Party (PT) and Citizens’ Movement (Movimiento Ciudano) allies.
The PAN is expected to end up with 118 seats, 24 less than in the prior
legislature. The PAN is expected to be the second largest party in the Senate.
Its expected 41 seats will be nine fewer than before.
Although AMLO lost
by a much larger margin than his razor thin 2006 loss, the PRD and its allies picked up a hefty
52 more seats in the Chamber of Deputies. Their expected 140 seats will make the
left the second largest grouping in the Chamber for the next two years. The
party’s gains came at the expense of the PAN and PRI-Greens, which dropped 24
and 30 seats, respectively. The PRD-PT-Citizens’ Movement coalition lost four seats in
the Senate. With just 29 seats, the left will be a distant third force in the Senate.
