Politics: Pointing to opposition legislators as traitors steps up AMLO´s polarization offensive
While President López Obrador and his supporters intensified their attacks on the opposition after the administration’s electric power sector constitutional reform proposal died in Congress on Easter Sunday, over the past week their lambasting of those who voted against the reform for betraying the country took a potentially more sinister turn: Morena National President Mario Delgado announced that within a month they will formally accuse all 223 opposition members of the Chamber of Deputies of treason – a move that AMLO later implicitly endorsed. While legal experts argued that the Attorney General’s Office would never be able to make such a case stick, it could take as long as two years of litigation and political posturing before the courts finally determine there is no basis for the charges. There never comes a time in politics when one can conclude that a confrontation has played itself out, but what is clear is that moving from the demagogic branding of political opponents as traitors to actually threatening them with trials that would entail removing them from office are major strides toward creating a grave political crisis.
The governing camp and the opposition will have numerous opportunities to square off in the coming months starting with this June’s six gubernatorial contests, including four in which the incumbents belong to the PAN or PRI. We can expect Morena to do everything in its power, whether legal or illicit, to win, and we cannot rule out a similar willingness to bend the rules on the part of some opposition governors struggling to keep their party or group in power. These campaigns will also be a challenge for the “Va Por México” coalition, whose durability will also be tested as attention shifts later this year toward the fall session of Congress, at which AMLO intends to present a major political/electoral reform package and fight a tough 2023 budget battle. The reform proposal includes some more technical considerations that are open to discussion, but the package is assuredly going to be rejected given that even AMLO’s minor party allies would literally be committing suicide by supporting a reform that would slash, for both allies and the opposition, the public funding of parties and the proportional representation rules that are essential to their survival.
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