The Judicial Reform promoted by Mexican President Andrés Manuel López Obrador (AMLO) is getting closer to becoming a reality. On Wednesday, September 4, the House of Representatives approved the initiative with 359 votes in favor and 135 against. The ruling MORENA party has a majority in the House thanks to its alliance with the Labor Party (PT) and the Green Ecologist Party of Mexico (PVEM). The Reform will have to be discussed in the next few days by the Senate of the Republic, where two-thirds of the votes are required to approve the Executive’s initiative. AMLO’s mandate ends on October 1 and has expressed that he hopes to pass the measure before then.
¡La reforma al Poder Judicial será una realidad!
Tras su aprobación en la Cámara de Diputados, la reforma se aprobará en el Senado de la República y en los Congresos locales.
Muy pronto la voluntad popular se verá reflejada en la reforma Constitucional. pic.twitter.com/1lQILOOEXY
— Morena (@PartidoMorenaMx) September 5, 2024
The Judicial Reform proposes, among other measures, the reduction of the number of members of the Supreme Court, the creation of a judicial administration body and a Disciplinary Court, the direct election of all judges of the Mexican judicial system as of 2025 (more or less 1600 officials), the drastic reduction of the current economic benefits of the nation’s judges, and the reduction of the length of the term of office. The initiative has been met with fierce resistance from the political opposition to AMLO’s government, as well as international economic and political forces that see in the transformation of the judicial system some uncertainties for the business they have in the country.
Read more: What is AMLO’s judicial reform and why is the Mexican right uniting to try and stop it
The international opposition to the Reform provoked a diplomatic impasse between the Executive and the ambassadors of the United States and Canada, in which AMLO gave an ultimatum to the ambassadors to desist from their “interfering” comments on local politics. Additionally, the US NGO Human Rights Watch suggested that the democratic election of judges endangers judicial independence and asked the executive to reconsider.
Thousands of judicial workers have declared an indefinite strike to pressure legislators to vote against the bill. Many of the strikers blocked the Chamber of Deputies on Wednesday, September 4 to prevent the vote on the Judicial Reform from taking place. However, the legislators held the session in an alternative venue (in a sports center) in which they approved the transformation of the judicial system.
According to the supporters of Judicial Reform, this is the only way to “purge” the justice system which is corrupt and full of not only judges who are allegedly at the service of the most powerful national and international economic groups but also by drug trafficking cartels. Furthermore, AMLO has stated on several occasions that the opposition within the judicial system is due to the enormous number of privileges that several judges will lose when implementing the Judicial Reform.
However, Morena and its allies cannot yet be sure that the Judicial Reform will be approved by the Senate. They still need three votes to secure the transformation that AMLO considers essential to change the Mexican justice system. It now remains to be seen how skillful the Executive’s negotiators will be in securing those three votes that separate them from what will probably be AMLO’s last battle as President of Mexico.
