Politics: Presidential approval slips

MEXICO - Report 06 Jul 2020 by Guillermo Valdes and Francisco González

President López Obrador has realized a goal he seems to have set for himself from the outset that has become a growing presence in his daily morning press conferences: a discourse consciously designed to pit society between those who back him against all those who do not and might stand in his way. But at this point that exercise appears to be playing against his political designs.

The latest GEA-ISA quarterly survey of opinion among the country’s registered voters recorded a continuing shift toward increasingly negative perceptions of the current state of the country three months into the Covid-19 pandemic and deepening recession. The starkly more critical responses regarding economic and political conditions and policies dovetailed with an acceleration of an earlier shift toward disillusionment with the government.

Presidential approval has been waning for four quarters and is currently 27 points lower than in June 2019. In the previous poll from mid March the public was pretty evenly divided in its assessment of the president, but the latest survey marks the first time since AMLO took office in which more Mexicans disapprove than approve of his performance.

President López Obrador’s failure to date to fulfill his promises for improving household economies and public safety while rooting out corruption is probably the chief cause of the decline in presidential popularity. Almost 40% of respondents say the economy is the greatest problem facing the country, and 63% describe their family’s economic situation as bad or very bad. Perceptions of deteriorating public security are more pronounced than they were six months ago, and those of rising corruption are also greater than they were at this point in the administration of President Enrique Peña Nieto. Both maintain an elevated correlation with opinions as to AMLO’s time in office.

And when we cross reference presidential approval responses against respondents’ political preferences we can see a total political polarization. No one who said they identified with an opposition party expressed support for the president’s work in office.

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