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Mexico's June 6 mid-term elections were historic, not just in terms of its size, but also in their significance. With over 21,000 seats up for election from the federal to the local level, the election was viewed by many as a referendum on President L贸pez Obrador's first three years in office. While the President's Morena party had significant electoral victories, the coalition of the opposing parties鈥攖he PRI, PAN, and PRD鈥攁lso performed well in some respects. 

The results of the June 6 election show both continuity and change in the Mexican political landscape. The Mexico Institute, UCSD's Center of U.S.-Mexican Studies, Oraculus, and Tijuana Innovadora hosted an event Tuesday, June 15, 2021 at 12:00pm Eastern time, which analyzed the election results and what they mean for the future of Mexican politics and U.S.-Mexico relations.

Selected Quotes

Kathleen Bruhn

 鈥淢ore than half of the population voted against Juntos Hacemos Histor铆a and Morena. There is a clear and strong desire for more options and for pluralism and for checks on the power of the president, which is a really good sign for the future of Mexican democracy.鈥�

 鈥淚 think it鈥檚 premature to say that the reaction to the feminist marches [in Mexico] has had no effect. The percentages overall may look the same, but the marches were never about the majority of Mexican women. They were about educated, young, Mexican women. The self-defined feminists鈥� What we鈥檙e seeing is that young, educated women are not happy with what鈥檚 going on under L贸pez Obrador.鈥�

鈥淚 think overall, these elections were a positive sign for Mexican democracy. Nobody boycotted the election. There were no major incidents of violence on election day. There was no major evidence of fraud. The INE worked鈥攄espite the pandemic, despite everything that was going on鈥� In all of these respects there鈥檚 evidence that both at the elite and the mass level, people want democracy in Mexico to continue.鈥�

Viridiana Rios

鈥淚 think that the main result of this election is actually really positive. It is in the capacity of the opposition to meaningfully confront L贸pez Obrador.鈥�

鈥淢orena never won a qualified majority at the polls and that鈥檚 something that we need to understand. Morena, in the 2018 election, won 308 seats. That鈥檚 far away from the 334 seats that you need in order to construct a [qualified] majority. Now, what happened? What happened is that the鈥� super majority of Morena was constructed later, after the [2018] election. How they did that [was] by cheating, basically by making the legislators from all other parties renounce their party affiliation and join Morena. But that was not the [win] that they had at the polls. That was not what the Mexican electorate wanted, and that鈥檚 critical to understand.鈥�

鈥淚 think that the international press has kind of fallen into a鈥� self indulgence, comparing the results of Morena not to reality, but to their fears, to what they thought Morena was going to win, to the powerful Morena that AMLO (Andr茅s Manuel L贸pez Obrador) is constantly telling us about in the 尘补帽补苍别谤补蝉. But the 尘补帽补苍别谤补蝉 are not reality, and we cannot keep interpreting results in the way that AMLO wants us to interpret results.鈥�

Leo Zuckermann

鈥淎t the federal level, if this was a soccer game, then the winner would have been Morena because it scored more goals [and] won more representatives鈥� It鈥檚 a plurality, it鈥檚 a relative majority, a simple majority for Morena.鈥�

鈥淗owever鈥� If you see an electoral map, [Morena] lost in the bigger cities, which suggests that they lost the vote of the middle class.鈥�

鈥淎fter 25 years of democracy in Mexico, there [are] some kind of鈥� democratic roots that are taking over the country... Society showed that in Mexico, we want democracy.鈥�