AMLO has once again weakened Mexican democracy. Just three weeks before handing over power to his hand-picked successor, Andrés Manuel López Obrador (AMLO) hectored congress into approving his harebrained scheme to make most Mexican judgeships—including the Supreme Court—subject to election rather than appointment.
Other than the personality cult around AMBLO, this is particularly bad in a country like Mexico with drug cartels who distort elections through intimidation, financial support, and violence. AMLO’s judicial reforms are portrayed as facilitating cartel control over the judiciary, leading to a “mafia state” where criminal interests overshadow citizens’ rights.
This is particularly worrying because this appears to be a return to the “perfect dictatorship” of the PRI that ruled Mexico for most of the 20th century. Back then, the party controlled every bit of the state and won every election for more than seven decades. Elections were rigged. Courts virtually always ruled in favor of the government. The checks and balances written into the constitution were a dead letter.
Americans should care about this, because the United States needs a minimally functional democracy on its southern border. The institutional degradation Mexico is experiencing, along with its government’s apparent willingness to cede large chunks of territory to drug cartels, is incompatible with Mexico’s long-term prosperity and stability. And a poor and unstable Mexico is not just an economic drag on the United States, it’s also the ultimate push factor for migration. Nobody wants this. But it’s no longer clear that it can still be stopped.
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Submission Statement
AMLO has once again weakened Mexican democracy. Just three weeks before handing over power to his hand-picked successor, Andrés Manuel López Obrador (AMLO) hectored congress into approving his harebrained scheme to make most Mexican judgeships—including the Supreme Court—subject to election rather than appointment.
Other than the personality cult around AMBLO, this is particularly bad in a country like Mexico with drug cartels who distort elections through intimidation, financial support, and violence. AMLO’s judicial reforms are portrayed as facilitating cartel control over the judiciary, leading to a “mafia state” where criminal interests overshadow citizens’ rights.
This is particularly worrying because this appears to be a return to the “perfect dictatorship” of the PRI that ruled Mexico for most of the 20th century. Back then, the party controlled every bit of the state and won every election for more than seven decades. Elections were rigged. Courts virtually always ruled in favor of the government. The checks and balances written into the constitution were a dead letter.
Americans should care about this, because the United States needs a minimally functional democracy on its southern border. The institutional degradation Mexico is experiencing, along with its government’s apparent willingness to cede large chunks of territory to drug cartels, is incompatible with Mexico’s long-term prosperity and stability. And a poor and unstable Mexico is not just an economic drag on the United States, it’s also the ultimate push factor for migration. Nobody wants this. But it’s no longer clear that it can still be stopped.
!ping LATAM