The 2024 Mexican election will be held on June 2, with Mexico’s voters turning their attention to the race for the presidency.
Incumbent president Andrés Manuel López Obrador, affectionately known as AMLO, was elected to his post in 2018 on his third attempt. Per the Mexican Constitution, however, he is going to be one-and-done: Presidents may only serve at most one six-year term (el sexenio) in office. In fact, apropos of nothing, even if a president serves less than six years, they are not eligible to run ever again. Presidents, as well as state-level governors, get just one term and that is it.
This iron-clad term limit means Mexico elects a new face each time. With AMLO on his way out, who will be on the way in?
Mexico’s election comes at a busy time in the world’s electoral calendar. South Africa voted on May 29, India’s election results will be announced on June 4, and the United Kingdom goes to the polls on July 4.
2024 Mexican Election: The Presidency
Mexico is all but certain to elect its first female president this week. Representing the left-wing incumbent party, MORENA, is Claudia Sheinbaum. She was the head of government of Mexico City for four and a half years, leaving her post in 2023. Sheinbaum rode into office on López Obrador’s MORENA wave, and now, she is the favorite to succeed him.
Her main opponent is Xóchitl Galvez, a former senator who left office a little under a year ago. She represents the right-win PAN (National Action Party), which is part of a big-tent coalition in opposition to MORENA. The other members are the PRI (Institutional Revolutionary Party) and PRD (Party of the Democratic Revolution).
There is a third candidate, though he distantly trails in opinion polls. Jorge Máynez served as a deputy until earlier this year, and will represent the Citizens’ Movement (MC) in this election.
All indications are that Sheinbaum will win the election and become the new president later this year. Mexico uses first-past-the-post to elect their president.
2024 Congressional Elections in Mexico
MORENA enters the election as the first-place party in both houses of Mexico’s legislature. Every single seat in the Congress is up for grabs this time.
In the 2021 midterm elections, MORENA gained seven seats in the lower house (Chamber of Deputies), and currently sit at 202 out of 500. With the help of coalition partners, they control an overall majority. If Sheinbaum wins the thundering victory that is predicted, it will be interesting to see how many members of her own party will ride on the wave with her. The last time any single party won an outright majority in the Chamber of Deputies was 1994. However, given that 40 percent of the seats come from a type of proportional representation, and Mexico has many parties, this is difficult to do. Under Article 54 of the Mexican Constitution, any majority party is capped at 300 seats.
As for the Senate, a quarter of the 128 senators are elected by proportional representation, and the remaining three-quarters by the states. MORENA got close to, but did not win, an outright Senate majority in 2018. As of this election day, MORENA is far ahead of everyone else, with 57 seats, while PAN holds 18 and PRI 13.
Opinion Polls for the 2024 Mexican Election
AS/COA reports that there has been convergence around the idea of Sheinbaum winning by a comfortable margin. She may crest 50 percent of the vote in a three-person race, with those same polls indicating Galvez, for the most part, sits in the 30s.
With regards to the Congress, polling also indicates that while no party is registering an absolute majority of support, MORENA is far ahead of its opposition in the 40s. The resulting outcome based on these numbers would look very similar to the election results in 2018.
