Can Mexico and the US understand each other?
by Luis Lozano.
Perhaps one of the more complex relationships in the world is the one between Mexico and the United States. Sure, anyone will say that relationships between neighbors are always complex. Germany, France, Spain and England spent centuries at war between themselves to maintain access to markets, geographic dominium and prevalence of their religion. But their past is common, and their populations have lived in those places for millennia.
The US and Mexico are two young countries, shaped by distinct worldviews rooted in the different empires that conquered and created them. On the US side, the prevalence of puritanism and Protestantism. Britons settled in the Northeast based the culture on collective work and humbleness. On the Mexican side (including Texas and California), no colony was created, even though Mexicans like to call it like that; the strategy of the Catholic Spanish crown was to delegate royal power to the viceroy of the territory called New Spain. The Spaniards inherited a Roman tradition of incorporating conquered populations into their culture, which is why building cities, churches, and universities was so important to them. Both of the oldest universities in the Americas were founded by Spain in what is now Lima (Perú) and Mexico City in 1551. No university was founded in North America by the English settlers at the time.
However, once both countries fought for their independence, differences started to appear which saw the US become an Empire and Mexico a nation still struggling with its profoundly different realities. One of the most important chapters in the US-Mexico relationship is how Mexico lost half of its territory to the United States. How each country has internalized this historical event perfectly reflects their distinct, idiosyncratic identities and outlooks.
Judicial reform is Sheinbaum’s Frankenstein
by Emiliano Polo.
Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum will not govern the political order she has helped construct. Under the guise of a so-called “judicial reform,” she has championed the creation of a new political system, one that now lies beyond her control. In their relentless pursuit of domination, she and her party failed to establish a coherent regime, instead unleashing a disordered and volatile landscape they neither fully understand nor command. She likely believed she was inheriting the rewards of a master plan orchestrated by the previous López Obrador administration to concentrate power. In reality, she accepted a Faustian bargain, one that now threatens to consume its intended beneficiaries.
Illiberal regimens indeed have to subdue and weaken the judiciary not only because they are barricades against arbitrariness, but because judicial systems are complex arrangements, hard to redesign and reestablish; any attempt by the opposition to reestablish the rule of law will be an arduous and lengthy process: national legal systems go beyond norms, bills, lawyers, and judges; they shape and constitute practices, mores, and attitudes that are hard to reconstruct.
The president and the ruling party, which no longer complies with her wishes, will control some judges, maybe most of the time, but not all the time; and it is precisely in this projection of inconsistency that a sign of weakness will prevail instead of power and control.
This was a reform not just designed to weaken the judiciary but to distribute it as a bounty; as in any corrupt scheme or proposition, the supporters expected their reward and part of the spoils. Likely, the president thought she would be spared from the unpredictable and anarchic environment that she sponsored; most likely, she will be a victim.
Pride & Prejudice: Mexico’s flag becomes a flashpoint — again
by Arturo Sarukhán (Ambassador of Mexico to the United States, 2007 - 2013)
This was a domestic clash waiting to happen, largely concocted in the Oval Office but potentially exacerbated in Mexico City’s National Palace, risking spillover into bilateral ties with Mexico.
Last Friday, after the US Department of Homeland Security conducted workplace raids in Los Angeles’ garment district targeting undocumented immigrants, protests erupted against ICE. President Donald Trump then took an unprecedented step, commandeering California’s National Guard to crack down on protesters. Demonstrations had been mostly peaceful, but tensions flared significantly after Trump deployed troops, intentionally confronting a Democratic mayor and governor. By sidestepping Gov. Gavin Newsom’s authority, Trump pushed presidential boundaries and fueled criticism of inflaming the situation for political gain. Undoubtedly, it has all the elements the president seeks: a showdown with a top political rival in a deep blue state over an issue core to his agenda and appealing to key voter segments.
Yet, as with everything in this polarized, social media-driven era, where immigration policy and immigrants themselves are weaponized, the events unfolding in Los Angeles resonate far beyond civil rights and constitutional debates, or authoritarianism versus liberal democracy, or even red versus blue America.
Editor’s note: Trump’s LA crackdown pushes Sheinbaum into a corner
by Andrew Law.
The surreal events this week in my old hometown of Los Angeles are spiraling from a local crisis into an international fiasco. Mexico’s former Ambassador to the United States, Martha Bárcena, tells me in stark terms that the relationship is trapped, “Like a hostage, in the middle of a very, very extreme fight for power in the US.”
It all started with ICE raids targeting Home Depots across LA and the detention of people in the basement of ICE’s downtown office. Protesters gathered spontaneously outside ICE headquarters, prompting White House aide Stephen Miller to engineer an unprecedented and aggressive response: President Trump federalized California’s National Guard, a move Governor Gavin Newsom says has no legal grounds. It was, Newsom insists, designed to incite anger and provoke more demonstrations.
And provoke it did.
We’re now inundated with incendiary visuals of protesters waving Mexican flags amidst flames and debris — images eagerly pounced on by Miller and Trump’s MAGA followers as supposed proof of a “foreign insurrection.”
Morena’s voter disconnect laid bare in judicial vote
by David Agren.
Former president Andrés Manuel López Obrador appeared in public for the first time in eight months to cast his ballot in the recent judicial elections. The man known as AMLO voted using a cheat sheet, which listed the candidates endorsed by his Morena party.
“I wanted to participate in this historic election,” AMLO said afterward. “I’m very happy to live in a free and democratic country.”
AMLO along with his protégé and successor, President Claudia Sheinbaum – whom he lauded Sunday as “the best president in the world” – hailed the election of nearly 900 judges and magistrates as a democratic success.
The country’s hapless opposition branded the exercise a farce and boycotted the process. Many Mexicans, meanwhile, showed a crushing indifference and stayed home; just 13% of registered voters cast ballots, while 10% of those ballots were annulled.
The elections delivered the outcome that AMLO presumably wanted when he purged the courts with his so-called judicial reform and put all judges and magistrates, including supreme court justices, to popular vote.
The supreme court candidates on most of the cheat sheets distributed by Morena operatives won their races. Three of the justices: Yasmín Esquivel, Lenia Batres, Loretta Ortiz, were already on the bench – with the first two nominated by AMLO – while of the others had ties to the former president.
Mexico’s judiciary now serves many masters
by Jacques Coste.
Many analysts have argued that Mexico’s recent judicial elections removed the last check on presidential power because several candidates with clear connections or affinities with Morena won, and hence the Supreme Court justices will be aligned with the ruling party. But this is only part of the story. The scenario is even worse. Mexico’s judiciary will respond partially to the interests of the executive branch, but it will also respond to the objectives of different regional elites, such as local political leaders, businesspersons, law firms, and organized-crime groups.
The reason why so many analysts believe that Mexico’s judiciary will exclusively respond to the president’s wishes is that they are taking the PRI regime as a model. However, there are two problems with this assumption.
First, during the PRI regime, the Supreme Court - and the judicial system as a whole - wasn’t as subsumed into the power orbit of the executive branch as is generally thought. As historian Pablo Mijangos argues, while it is true that the post-revolutionary Supreme Court lent constitutional legitimacy to the actions of the sitting president, it is also true that the justices enjoyed broad autonomy when deciding the majority of cases, which did not clearly concern the executive branch.
In other words, during the PRI regime, the judiciary supported the hegemonic party in controversies directly linked to the interests of the sitting president. But the way judges resolved cases between common citizens depended on a combination of factors, such as the ideology and capabilities of the judges, money and power differentials between the parties involved, and relationships (or lack thereof) between the citizens and PRI members or government officials who could help them pressure the judges. This will be the case once again in Mexico - but with an additional layer of complexity. And this is where the second problem with the assumption that the president will control the entire judiciary comes in.
On Mexico’s imminent risk
by Macario Schettino.
Last Sunday, elections were held in Mexico—very unusual elections that are virtually unheard of in any other country in the world. Judges, magistrates, and justices were elected in order to completely replace the Supreme Court, to create a new Judicial Discipline Tribunal, and to fill the federal and local electoral courts, which had been incomplete. Not only that—more than eight hundred circuit magistrates and judges were elected, for a total of 881 positions.
With this election, and the law that made it possible, the Judicial Branch in Mexico ceases to be autonomous and becomes subordinated to the Executive Branch, which also controls the Legislative Branch thanks to the qualified majorities it obtained illegally just days after last year’s presidential election. Put more simply, Mexico ceases to be a republic and becomes an authoritarian system. The new judges will take office in September.
This new distribution of power—or rather, concentration of power—is a major change from just a few years ago, when the USMCA was signed, and it actually contradicts that agreement. It adds to changes in energy policy, which are also incompatible, and I don't think it will make negotiations for a new deal with the United States and Canada any easier. Even more concerning, the risk for existing investments in Mexico has increased, as the mechanisms previously available for dispute resolution have disappeared.
Amid international fallout, a local tragedy
by Madeleine Wattenbarger.
Until last week, Ximena Guzmán Cuevas and José Muñoz were not public figures. Longstanding members of the ruling Morena Party, they both held senior positions in Mexico City’s government. Guzmán worked as Mayor Clara Brugada’s personal secretary; Muñoz as an adviser, coordinating closely with the national government, including on security issues. On Tuesday, May 20, a little after 7 a.m., Guzmán pulled over on a busy stretch of Tlalpan Avenue to pick up her coworker. A gunman fired twelve shots into the car, killing both Ximena and Pepe.
The assassination was timed for maximum visibility: up the road, in the National Palace and in view of the press, Security Secretary Omar García Harfuch informed President Sheinbaum of the events. She announced the news live to the nation.
A week later, information is scarce and the suspects remain at large. At a press conference the day after the murders, Mexico City’s top prosecutor, Bertha Alcalde Luján, and Public Security Secretary Pablo Vázquez Camacho refrained from answering questions about possible motives. The location, timing, and calculated execution suggest a professional hit: the assassins worked in a trio, used gloves to avoid leaving fingerprints, and escaped in a stolen car into the eastern fringes of Mexico State.
Many Mexicans won’t vote in Sunday’s judicial elections; will AMLO?
by David Agren.
Mexico holds judicial elections on Sunday, which will select nearly 900 judges – including supreme court justices – via popular vote. But the much anticipated elections are unfolding amid confusion, controversial candidates, and crushing disinterest – with voters paying scant attention and the ruling MORENA party marshalling voters in what was supposed to be a non-partisan vote. Then there’s the opposition boycott.
President Claudia Sheinbaum targeted the opposition throughout the week leading up to the June 1 vote. She jawboned them from the bully pulpit of her morning press conference. And she employed the familiar schoolyard taunt effectively used by her predecessor and populists the world over: I know you are but what am I?
“Who is more anti-democratic: the ones calling for everyone to elect the judiciary or the ones calling for not voting? Who is more democratic?” Sheinbaum said in the Wednesday mañanera. “The argument is very convoluted, isn’t it? If the president had wanted to pick the Supreme Court’s justices, we wouldn’t have ended up as we were before. Why all the fuss?”
Three points on Mexico’s judicial vote
by Luis Rubio.
Judicial reform reaches its critical moment this coming Sunday. After the constitutional reform was approved last September, this Sunday citizens will vote for judges, magistrates, and justices of the Supreme Court of Justice. There is no precedent in the world (with the small exception of Bolivia) where a country has undertaken an exercise of this nature. The requirements for someone to aspire to one of these positions were minimal and unrelated to the function they are to perform. In fact, the most important requirement was having been approved by a panel in which Morena had a majority in almost every case. However, this does not mean that Morena is (or acted as) a monolithic bloc; rather, everything indicates that the candidates for the various positions reflect the diversity of interests within Morena’s factions and some societal groups, including organized crime.
The main argument used to justify the election was that democracy means electing judges directly by the electorate. The logic behind this is a literal interpretation of democracy, as opposed to the traditional liberal definition, which includes checks and balances. Above all, the reform rejects the notion that the role of the judiciary is to interpret and enforce the law, and, in the case of the Supreme Court, to resolve “ties” between the other two branches of government — the executive and the legislative.
Three considerations about what lies ahead: