1988 Mexican general election

The Federal Law of Political Organizations and Electoral Processes (LFOPPE), which resulted from the political reform of 1977, was in effect for the previous legislative elections in 1985, which saw the full renewal of the Chamber of Deputies. The Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI) won 292 seats, the National Action Party (PAN) 38, while five parties won 11–12 seats and a further two parties won six seats each. The PRI had a supermajority of around 72% of the Deputies in the Chamber of the LIII Legislature. Miguel de la Madrid presidency (1982–1988) In the 1982 general elections the PRI, along with the Popular Socialist Party (PPS) and the Authentic Party of the Mexican Revolution (PARM), had received 71% of the vote. Once in office, President Miguel de la Madrid implemented a "severe austerity program" that included cuts to public services and social spending. The decline in oil prices in 1985, compounded by the September 19 earthquake of the same year; destroyed the economic stabilization that had resulted from the government's response to the debt crisis at the beginning of the decade.The earthquake's political ramifications included the need for the country to collaborate together for rescue and reconstruction efforts in the face of government inaction, resulting in "civil associationism." In 1987, inflation reached a high of 159%. The government's "adoption of neoliberal policy and the consolidation [in power] [...] of a group of technocrats" was a result of the debt growth, the deepening economic crisis, and the agreements it made with the IMF to continue receiving loans. This behavior also resulted in the social unrest that "politicians who feel displaced and who continue to support the thesis of revolutionary nationalism" brought about." At the political level, the electoral and constitutional reforms were a government response to pressure from the opposition, "at the same time [they obeyed] the control purposes of the ruling party." The CFE's composition changed, putting the PRI front and center and eliminating the need for support from opposition parties; furthermore, it was confirmed that this encouraged the so-called "parastatal parties," also known as voters. The opposition started to gain traction during this time, both on the left and the right, to the point where the PAN started to pose a "threat" to the PRI in some state elections, as happened in the formed the within the PRI in 1986. Its establishment was caused by the "abandonment of State intervention in the economy, budget cuts, privatization of companies in the parastatal sector and the contraction of social spending." This shift in governmental action implied, for Cárdenas and Muñoz Ledo, a betrayal of the party's ideological foundation, "the ideology of the Mexican Revolution." 1986 constitutional reforms An agreement signed by President Miguel de la Madrid was published in the Official Gazette of the Federation (DOF) on 19 June 1986. It directed the Ministry of the Interior to call on national political parties, associations, organizations, institutions and citizens to take part in "public consultation hearings on the Electoral Political renewal [...]" in order to seek feedback that would enable the president to "find ways of democratic improvement." The reforms, which involved adjustments to the Chamber of Deputies electoral system, were approved by the Chamber at the end of November, and published in the DOF on 15 December. The changes included increasing the number of deputies from 400 to 500 by raising the number of seats elected by proportional representation from 100 to 200, limiting the maximum number of seats that the party with the most votes could win (350) and allowing all parties to participate in elections regardless of their percentage of the total votes cast. To guarantee that a party maintained an absolute majority in the Chamber, a mechanism was also established: "The party with the greatest evidence of majority will be assigned proportional representation deputies, until the absolute majority is reached [...]" if no party receives 51% of the effective national vote and none of them reach half plus one of the chamber's members. In contrast, a three-year decree established the Senate's partial renewal. With the implementation of the annual electoral roll review, the new electoral code eliminated conditional registration of political formations, facilitated coalition formation, and established the principle of public financing for political parties based on vote and seat totals. It changed the composition of the Federal Electoral Commission (CFE) and added the Federal Electoral Contentious Tribunal, which is in charge of handling claims, complaints, and annulment appeals: However, the Congress of the Union established political party representation, with one commissioner for each formation receiving 1.5% of the vote and one for each additional 3%, up to a maximum of 16 commissioners per party. It would still be led by the Secretary of the Interior, who also served as its president. Parallel vote tabulation This was the first time that a parallel vote tabulation was implemented in Mexico, and the results were informed by telephone from the electoral districts to the secretariat of the Interior. The institution in charge of counting the votes was the Comisión Federal Electoral (CFE), presided by the Secretary of the Interior, Manuel Bartlett. On July 2, four days before the elections, Francisco Xavier Ovando, Cárdenas' top adviser, and his assistant Román Gil were assassinated in Mexico City. According to Cárdenas, Ovando designed a network to collect information from the 300 electoral districts on election day in order to prevent the PRI from engaging in electoral fraud. Two days later, FDN representatives protested the assassination outside the Secretariat of the Interior. Manuel Bartlett promised that the government would investigate the crime immediately, but it took many years before four Michoacán Police agents were charged with the assassination, with José Franco Villa (the state's attorney general at the time) among the intellectual authors.The Governor of Michoacán at the time of the assassinations, Luis Martínez Villicaña, had been one of Cárdenas fiercest rivals, and had heavily repressed FDN officials and sympathizers in the State. ==Organization==

Electoral authorities With the reforms of 1986 and 1987, the composition of the Federal Electoral Commission (CFE) was transformed. The consolidation of power within the PRI under its president, the Secretary of the Interior, and the PRI's increased strength within the body "appear as government attempts to strengthen control over electoral competition." They make clear, though, that these intentions were not successful due to the political environment. The votes came from 16 commissioners, two congressional representatives, and the commission president. The opposition parties' request to extend the registration period, which was set by the Code to end on December 31, 1987, is an example of the aforementioned. The PRI voted against it, claiming it would be illegal and shorten other deadlines. Approximately 38 million people were added to the voter registry in preparation for these elections. The National Population Council (CONAPO) estimated that by 1987, the number of Mexicans with voting rights would be 43.5 million. For the opposition, a few media outlets, and subject-matter experts believed that the registry was untrustworthy. Twenty to thirty percent were thought to be irregular. In this regard, the National Institute of Statistics and Geography (INEGI), which calculated that 40 million people had the right to vote, joined CONAPO. The Republic's presidency, for its part, estimated that there would be "close to 38 million Mexicans." The official data indicated 38,074,926 individuals on the registry. Similarly, the Mexican Socialist Party (PMS) withdrew its candidacy in favor of Cuauhtémoc Cárdenas, and the PRI was able to enforce its choice. The PRI denied the request to reprint the electoral ballots, whose printing was handled by the Nation's Graphic Workshops, in order to keep the discussion focused on technical matters. as with the number of registered voters, the number of boxes installed varies according to the sources at the time - between 54,652 and 56,642. As opposed to the previous statement, assuring, the CFE did, on occasion, attempt to reach an understanding and compromise on "thorny issues." They cite the formation of a subcommittee tasked with investigating allegations of destroying electoral propaganda and using public funds to benefit the PRI, as well as a complaint filed against Televisa for airing a show that misrepresented the views of PRI opponents. The design of the electoral ballot for senators was also a source of contention, with opponents requesting differentiated voting for one party for the six-year period and another for the three-year period - given that the Senate was partially renewed, a candidate from each state would hold his position for six years and another for only three. According to the ruling of the Electoral Contentious Court, "the two formulas appeared on the same ballot and with a single circle per party." During the election year, the Court heard 23 appeals in total, approving the CFE's decision not to reprint the ballots following Pemesista's withdrawal. Nonetheless, the organization played a very small role in the election preparation process. ==Presidential candidates==

Institutional Revolutionary Party The PRI announced Carlos Salinas de Gortari, who was the Secretary of Programming and Budget at the time, as its nominee for president on 4 October 1987. At 10:30 a.m., the party president, Jorge de la Vega Domínguez, made the following announcement at the national headquarters in front of the sector leaders: "The three sectors of our party and its territorial leadership, have spoken unanimously in favor of comrade Carlos Salinas de Gortari's pre-candidacy." the selection process for candidates was, nevertheless, "a fictitious one [...] with a parade of the supposed pre-candidates, which was nothing more than a mere simulation." In keeping with PRI custom, the chosen one was picked by the Mexican president, and the "uncovering ritual" was repeated amid a setting of "presumed party unity." This "simulation" was the ruling party's reaction to the "democratizing current" that eventually led to the National Democratic Front (FDN) being formed and the departure of a number of militants. Cárdenas requested that the PRI issue a call for the PRI candidate's selection on 1 June 1987. As the "democratizers" gained momentum, the party became aware of it. At the end of the month, when Cárdenas and Muñoz Ledo intensified their calls for the PRI leaders, they were told not to use party resources, logos, or speak in their honor. In the end, Cárdenas was pre-nominated by the CD on 3 July, with the primary goal of "putting pressure on the party and government to open the presidential succession process." Together with other politicians, Cárdenas accepted the nomination at a rally held at his house in front of two thousand people, along with the virtual pre-campaign coordinator Muñoz Ledo and Ignacio Castillo Mena. In parallel, the PRI continued its uncovering process. According to the official version, the six names arose from visits throughout the country that de la Vega Domínguez made to meet with party and opinion leaders. To find out what they thought, the PRI "began a process of consultation with the bases and conversations with leaders". PRI members, on the other hand, declined to endorse any one candidate. The confusion continued until October 4 when, in the morning, Núcleo Radio Mil—which was later joined by Acir, Radio Formula and Radio Programas de México—erroneously reported—due to a rumor that del Mazo spread On the 29th, the CD issued a manifesto defending democratic legitimacy as "a last effort in this regard." Owing to resource constraints, the manifesto was only published until October 3. It was in this environment that "the possibility of negotiating a single left-wing candidacy was envisioned" before Cárdenas left the PRI. In any case, "that's what two opposition parties said"—the Mexican Socialist Party (PMS), led by Heberto Castillo, and the Popular Socialist Party (PPS), which is currently without a candidate. To come to a consensus, PPS leaders met with Cárdenas and Muñoz Ledo on 9 October. The PMS, for its part, tried to take in the CD. The Authentic Party of the Mexican Revolution (PARM), a third party, created a "serious link" in contrast to the "loose" approaches of the first two parties, and on 12 October a commission of assembly members proposed his candidacy. Cárdenas joined the PARM and participated in protests as its presidential candidate two days later. Castillo stated that Castdenas's candidacy was a serious political error and that his actions showed that he was more focused on the campaign than the issues facing the country. He even entertained the possibility that he could It is an action taken by the PRI directly. Likewise, the cupular decision of the nomination caused an "internal division" in the political formation. Because of the previously mentioned, Cárdenas was additionally expelled out of the PRI. Article 211 of the party's statutes, which states that "anyone who joins another party [...] or is nominated as a candidate by another party to oppose the PRI [...] [resigns] his capacity as a member of the PRI," is the reason for the exclusion, according to a statement issued by the party on 16 October. It left open the possibilities for other formations to join the candidacy; his recent trajectory, and that he did not impose conditions or try to "appropriate the movement and the legitimacy of the Current." During his speech, he declared that the PPS and other political factions would be joining him shortly. This materialized on 13 December, when at its XIII Congress the PPS nominated it and with this concluded "the stage of gestation of fundamental alliances of the Democratic Current with registered political organizations." Until the July 1988 elections, he acted as a "political actor with full personality and precise functions," and the FDN was not a "terminal objective" but rather a "political-historical-electoral instrument at the national and regional level to define basic alliances and convergences." One of them, Manuel J. Clouthier - also known as Maquío - publicly announced his affiliation to the political party on 16 November 1984 at a rally held by Carlos Castillo Peraza - PAN candidate for the municipal presidency of Mérida. Since then, he has participated in party events and ran for governor of Sinaloa against PRI candidate Francisco Labastida Ochoa in 1986. He and the other PAN gubernatorial candidates initiated a "more dynamic and aggressive style of conducting electoral campaigns" that included defending the vote in the event of fraud. PAN members used novel forms of "complaint and civil resistance" in response to a contentious defeat, which they saw as an act of electoral fraud. In Holy Week 1987, a group of PAN members and his friends convinced him to run in the internal race to be the PAN presidential candidate. Clouthier received endorsements from the state committees of Nayarit, Sinaloa, and Veracruz when he registered as a presidential candidate on September 3, the following year. Salvador Rosas Magallón, Jorge Eugenio Ortiz Gallegos, and Jesús González Schmal followed after him. The second, however, retired for health reasons. September and November were pre-campaign months. González Schmal supported a "radical pragmatic" PANism that was driven by the business community and aimed to "break with the State and the party," whereas Clouthier supported this "aggressive, populist, and contradictory" PANism. He represented the "doctrinary" and most conservative group. On November 22, Clouthier won the internal elections with 870 votes (70.3%), González Schmal received 335 votes (27%), and Rosas Magallón received 34 votes (2.7%). The convention lasted seven hours and took place in Mexico City's Juan de la Barrera gymnasium. González Schmal, who lost, expressed his support for Clouthier, who was also backed by party president Luis H. Alvarez. The candidate urged the populace "to resist and disobey those who, through the abuse of power, intend to continue oppressing them" and urged his opponents to sign a pledge against "fraudulent triumphs" and launch a "high-level political campaign." Direct and open primary elections were to be the "new" system. was the presidential candidate of the PMS Under this system, any citizen of Mexico could cast a ballot, not just affiliated members. After the registration period expired at the end of the month, four verified candidates for the 6 September primary election were facing one another. Three days later, the PMS National College of Voters reported that Castillo was emerging as the winner. Moments later, Becerra acknowledged his defeat and the next day Zepeda did the same. Castillo was announced as the party's presidential candidate on 13–14 September. During his campaign, he put forth a "minimum plan of political and social transformations" and a "radical" program of political action with the intention of creating an "alternative power for the people." Castillo eventually withdrew his candidacy in support of a unified Socialist coalition behind Cuauhtémoc Cárdenas Solórzano of the National Democratic Front a month before the elections of 1988. ==Campaign==

, Cárdenas and Clouthier campaigns campaigns The Madrid government anticipated that the opposition would grow in these elections, but it did not account for the spread of the vote that the "multiparty system" would bring about. The author claims that the "high degree of politicization of society" allowed a glimpse of the "crisis" to be seen during the election campaign. ==Opinion polls==

During this election, Mexico started using electoral polls more frequently. Numerous opinion polls were presented as a result of the conditions surrounding these elections, which produced a "high level of competition" and "uncertainty". He does, however, note that the majority were restricted to the Federal District and the Valley of Mexico metropolitan area. Its execution was the responsibility of educational institutions, with assistance from media sources like El Universal and La Jornada, as well as American groups like Gallup, Bendixen, and Law. There were more than twenty exercises that involved "very diverse" media, researchers and methodologies. it was also within these circumstances that "the first generation of Mexican institutions specialized in public opinion research emerged." Since the polls were not taken seriously before because, "in the social imagination," the PRI was virtually "invincible," this time they were a "novelty" because of their "proliferation and diffusion."There are nine nationwide surveys "of which we have a record," compared to twenty-one that are restricted to the Federal District. Similarly, it takes into account seven national polls and thirteen from the District, averaging them to award Salinas a victory of 52.0 percent and 36.95%, respectively. In the first instance, Clouthier came in second with 22.09%, and in the second, Cárdenas came in first with 31.85%. The PRI candidate received a minimum of 38% and a maximum of 61.4% of the total coverage nationwide. Regarding the nation's capital, Salinas led eight measurements, Cárdenas led four, and there was a technical tie in one. The questionnaires, sample sizes, survey types, and "quality of the results" varied, which prevented the surveys from offering "certainty or reliability regarding" the electoral process. The polls indicated that electoral fraud was planned, according to candidate Cárdenas, who shared this skepticism: "[The polls are] part of the game of the official party, but above all of the government, to alter the result of the election." Even though Salinas's numbers were favorable,  the PRI reached "unprecedented" percentages and that Cárdenas "represented a rising opposition." ==Conduct==

The Democratic Front and its leaders urged president De la Madrid to prevent an illegal act by bringing up the Salinas campaign's daily expenditures of one billion pesos and its strategy of pressuring and threatening the media to support the presidential campaign of the declared contender. The primary Mexican television news program, 24 Hours of Televisa, was then run by Jacobo Zabludovsky. Manuel Clouthier also criticized the unfairness of the process and the lack of objectivity in the coverage, leading to the creation of one of his campaign's catchphrases, "Don't watch 24 hours because it hides the truth." Democratic Front campaign collaborators Román Gil Heráldez and Francisco Javier Ovando Hernández were assassinated in Mexico City on July 2, four days prior to the elections. The Front's candidacy suffered irreversible harm when Ovando Hernández was named national coordinator of the plan to obtain electoral data from the polling places and districts. The elections started at eight in the morning, according to media reports, and the CFE set up its permanent session to oversee the proceedings at that point. Nearly all polling places had followed the proper procedures. Yet, beginning at 10:00 a.m., rumors spread regarding "difficulties in some boxes." At noon, "an unusual influx of voters" was reportedly seen, and in the middle of the afternoon, PAN representatives in Sinaloa, Durango, Guanajuato, and Querétaro "began to complain about irregularities," ensuring that although "instrumented" electoral surveillance was increased over the previous election cycle, its goals were not met. For a variety of reasons, the reported irregularities lacked the requisite "forcefulness"—many protest letters were not received by the Electoral Litigation Court, and certain district committees encountered difficulties in receiving and handling the complaint materials. Prohibition was also imposed, and starting at 03:00, the Army patrolled the polls in a "constant and discreet" manner. Furthermore, 38,000 Navy personnel were quartered. 56 thousand police officers participated in the "largest police deployment" that took place in the Federal District. In addition to 124 Public Ministry agencies that the Attorney General's Office ordered to remain open for business twenty-four hours a day, there were approximately 2,500 notaries who also had to continue their operations. Among the anomalies that were brought up were the incomplete electoral rolls, the late release of the polling place's location, and the erasure of permanent ink. Clouthier and Cárdenas, backed by Ibarra de Piedra, started to "talk about joint actions." When the Commission meeting reconvened at 6:00 p.m. following a break, the criticism of actions like ballot box theft (sacks of ballots were tossed in the trash), the expulsion of poll workers at gunpoint,{{cite journal Only a few days after the election, the Federal Electoral Commission received reports of damaged official voting packets and paperwork appearing in various parts of the nation. There were also reports of forged ballots inside the polls and PRI corporate union leaders withholding voting credentials. ==Results==

The first official results arrived very slowly and inconsistently, but they showed that Cárdenas was in the lead. The first official preliminary results were expected to arrive at 19:00 on election day, but once that time arrived, the CFE informed that the counting system had "broken down", and that the CFE president had scheduled a meeting with the Technical Secretariat to "correct the issue". In the meantime, the opposition candidates began to denounce that they had not been granted full access to the counting centers, and marched together to the headquarters of the Secretariat of the Interior to denounce irregularities in the elections. Later that day, the aforementioned Bartlett said that the telephone network was saturated due to, among other things, adverse weather conditions, characterizing it as a "breakdown of the system." Then-president Miguel de la Madrid later admitted that this "breakdown" was a fabrication. One observer said, "For the ordinary citizen, it was not the network but the Mexican political system that had crashed." Although the CFE itself stated that it was not able to proclaim a winner yet due to the aforementioned "Network breakdown" (and in fact, would not release results until a week later), on 7 July at 03:10 the then-Secretary General of the PRI, Jorge de la Vega Domínguez, proclaimed that Salinas de Gortari had won by a great margin, stating that "Mexico has won and has given Carlos Salinas de Gortari a strong, legal and unobjectionable victory". Later that day, Salinas de Gortari himself also proclaimed that he had won. This sparked immediate protests from the opposition, who denounced that a massive electoral fraud was taking place. President Senate Chamber of Deputies ==Analysis==

Years later, the aforementioned Miguel de la Madrid admitted in an autobiography that the infamous "network breakdown" never happened, and that there was not yet any official vote count when the PRI declared Salinas as the winner. In 1991, the ruling PRI and the opposition PAN approved a motion to burn all the ballots, therefore removing all evidence of the fraud. In July 2017, Manuel Bartlett, former Secretary of the Interior, declared to the media that electoral fraud had been committed through the manipulation of figures, in addition to the fact that this had been carried out in complicity with the National Action Party to prevent Cuauhtémoc Cárdenas from becoming president. A 2019 study in the American Political Science Review found "evidence of blatant alterations" in approximately one third of the tallies in the election. ==Aftermath==

Numerous protests were held throughout the country in the following days. Some of the many irregularities denounced by the opposition included duplicated Voter ID's, anticipated delivery of ballots with votes already marked for the PRI, and even votes from dead people. The opposition legislators noted that the Constitution established the right of interpellation in Congress. On 9 September the Chamber of Deputies met to validate the elections. It was already expected that the Deputies would validate the election since the PRI held 263 out of its 500 seats, and thus the PRI legislators could validate the election by themselves even if the opposition unanimously voted against. After a 20-hour session in which the opposition legislators presented evidence of the fraud while the PRI members emphatically denied the accusations, the election results were validated: all 263 PRI legislators voted in favor, 85 opposition members voted against, and the rest abstained. The FDN legislators walked out during the voting. Thus, Salinas de Gortari was now officially President-elect. Of the five federal entities (the states of Baja California, Michoacán, Morelos, the State of Mexico and the Federal District) in which, according to the official results, Cárdenas had won, three of their State Governors (the Governor of Baja California Xicoténcatl Leyva Mortera, the Governor of Michoacán Luis Martínez Villicaña and the Governor of the State of Mexico Mario Ramón Beteta) were forced to resign in the following months by the PRI, which held them responsible for the party's defeat in those states. ==See also==