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Andrés Manuel López Obrador
López Obrador in 2024
65th President of Mexico
In office 1 December 2018 – 30 September 2024
Preceded by	Enrique Peña Nieto
Succeeded by	Claudia Sheinbaum
President pro tempore of CELAC
In office 8 January 2020 – 7 January 2022
Preceded by	Jeanine Áñez
Succeeded by	Alberto Fernández
President of the National Regeneration Movement
In office 20 November 2015 – 12 December 2017
Preceded by	Martí Batres
Succeeded by	Yeidckol Polevnsky
Head of Government of Mexico City
In office 5 December 2000 – 29 July 2005
Preceded by	Rosario Robles
Succeeded by	Alejandro Encinas Rodríguez
President of the Party of the Democratic Revolution
In office 2 August 1996 – 10 April 1999
Preceded by	Porfirio Muñoz Ledo
Succeeded by	Pablo Gómez Álvarez
Personal details
Born	(1953-11-13) 13 November 1953 (age 71) Tepetitán, Tabasco, Mexico
Political party	Morena (2012–2024)
Other political affiliations	Institutional Revolutionary Party (1976–1989) Party of the Democratic Revolution (1989–2012)
Spouses	Rocío Beltrán Medina ​ ​(m. 1979; died 2003)​ Beatriz Gutiérrez Müller ​ ​(m. 2006)​
Children	4
Relatives	Manuela Obrador Narváez (cousin)
Education	National Autonomous University of Mexico (BA)
Signature
Website	lopezobrador.org.mx

This article is part of a series about Andrés Manuel López Obrador
Federal District Government Presidency Morena Fourth Transformation National Guard Santa Lucía Airport Texcoco Airport Maya Train CIIT INSABI COVID-19 pandemic in Mexico LitioMX Presidential campaigns 2006 (coalition controversies) 2012 2018 (coalition opinion polling) Referendums 2021 (corruption trial) 2022 (presidential recall) Related "Abrazos, no balazos" ¿Quién es el señor López? Statue in Atlacomulco
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Andrés Manuel López Obrador (Spanish: [anˈdɾes maˈnwel ˈlopes oβɾaˈðoɾ] ; born 13 November 1953), also known by his initials AMLO, is a Mexican politician who served as the 65th president of Mexico from 2018 to 2024. He previously served as Head of Government of Mexico City from 2000 to 2005.

Born in Tepetitán, in the municipality of Macuspana, in the south-eastern state of Tabasco, López Obrador earned a degree in political science from the National Autonomous University of Mexico following a hiatus from his studies to participate in politics. He began his political career in 1976 as a member of the Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI). His first public position was as director of the Indigenous Institute of Tabasco, where he promoted the addition of books in indigenous languages. In 1989, he joined the Party of the Democratic Revolution (PRD), becoming the party's 1994 candidate for Governor of Tabasco and national leader between 1996 and 1999. In 2000, he was elected Head of Government of Mexico City. During his tenure, his crime, infrastructure, and social spending policies made him a popular figure on the Mexican left. In 2004, his state immunity from prosecution was removed after he refused to cease construction on land allegedly expropriated by his predecessor, Rosario Robles. This legal process lasted a year, ending with López Obrador maintaining his right to run for office.

López Obrador was nominated as the presidential candidate for the Coalition for the Good of All during the 2006 elections, where he was narrowly defeated by the National Action Party (PAN) candidate Felipe Calderón. While the Federal Electoral Tribunal noted some irregularities, it denied López Obrador's request for a general recount, which sparked protests nationwide. In 2011, he founded Morena, a civil association and later political party. He was a candidate for the Progressive Movement coalition in the 2012 elections, won by the Commitment to Mexico coalition candidate Enrique Peña Nieto. In 2012, he left the PRD after protesting the party's signing of the Pact for Mexico and joined Morena. As part of the Juntos Haremos Historia coalition, López Obrador was elected president after a landslide victory in the 2018 general election.

Described as being center-left, progressive, a left-wing populist, social democratic, and an economic nationalist, López Obrador has been a national politician for over three decades. During his presidency, he has promoted public investment in sectors that had been liberalized under previous administrations and has implemented several progressive social reforms. Supporters have praised him for promoting institutional renewal after decades of high inequality and corruption and refocusing the country's neoliberal consensus towards improving the state of the working class. Critics have claimed that he and his administration stumbled in their response to the COVID-19 pandemic and attempts to deal with drug cartels. He left office in September 2024, succeeded by Claudia Sheinbaum, and retired from electoral politics.

Early life

López Obrador was born in Tepetitán, a small village in the municipality of Macuspana, in the southern state of Tabasco, on 13 November 1953. He is the firstborn son of Andrés López Ramón (son of Lorenzo López and Beatriz Ramón) and Manuela Obrador González, Tabasco and Veracruz-based merchants. His younger siblings include José Ramón, José Ramiro, Pedro Arturo, Pío Lorenzo, and twins Candelaria Beatriz and Martín Jesús. His maternal grandfather José Obrador Revuelta was a Cantabrian who arrived as an exile in Mexico from Ampuero, Spain, while his maternal grandmother Úrsula González was the daughter of Asturians. Through his paternal grandparents, López Obrador is also of Indigenous and African descent.

López Obrador attended the only elementary school in town, the Marcos E. Becerra school, managed by the Seventh-day Adventist Church and named after the Mexican poet of the same name. During afternoons, he helped his parents at the La Posadita store. López Obrador began middle school in Macuspana but finished it in the state capital of Villahermosa, where his family moved in the mid-1960s and opened a clothes and shoe store called Novedades Andrés. On 8 June 1969, when he was 15 years old, his brother José Ramón López Obrador died from a gunshot to the head. According to Jorge Zepeda Patterson's [es] Los Suspirantes 2018, José Ramón found a pistol, played with it, and it slipped out of his hands, firing a bullet into his head. The Tabasco newspapers Rumbo Nuevo, Diario de Tabasco, and Diario Presente presented a story where they were both playing around with the pistol and that Andrés Manuel fired it by accident. According to Zepeda Patterson, Andrés Manuel became "taciturn, much more thoughtful" following the incident. López Obrador finished high school and, at age 19, went to Mexico City to study at the National Autonomous University of Mexico (UNAM).

He studied political science and public administration at the UNAM from 1973 to 1976. He returned to school to complete his education after having held several positions within the government of Tabasco and the Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI). In 1987, he received a degree in political science and public administration after the presentation of his thesis, Proceso de formación del Estado Nacional en México 1821-1867 (Formation Process of the National State in Mexico 1821–1867).

He lived in the Casa del Estudiante Tabasco during his college years on Violeta Street in the Guerrero neighborhood of Mexico City. The institution was financed by the administration of Tabasco governor Mario Trujillo García through efforts of the poet Carlos Pellicer, with whom López Obrador began discussing. There was empathy between the two because the young man raised his concern for the Chontal Maya. After the meeting, the poet invited him to his senate campaign during the 1976 elections. His university professor, Enrique González Pedrero, was another figure that influenced López Obrador's political trajectory.

After attending school from 1973 to 1976, he returned to his native Tabasco, where he held various government positions and was a professor at the Juárez Autonomous University of Tabasco.

Personal life

During his early career, he met Rocío Beltrán Medina, a sociology student, who suggested López Obrador embrace the progressive wing of the PRI. They eventually married on 8 April 1978. They had three sons: José Ramón López Beltrán (born 1981), Andrés Manuel López Beltrán (born 1986), and Gonzalo Alfonso López Beltrán (born 1991). Beltrán Medina died on 12 January 2003 due to respiratory arrest caused by lupus, which she had suffered for several years.

On 16 October 2006, he married Beatriz Gutiérrez Müller, who had worked in the Mexico City government during his tenure as Head of Government of Mexico City. Together they have one son, Jesús Ernesto López Gutiérrez (born 2007).

During his first presidential run, some news reports identified López Obrador as a Protestant; in a television interview, he self-identified as Catholic. In March 2018, he declared, "When I am asked what religion I adhere to, I say that I am a Christian, in the broadest sense of the word, because Christ is love and justice is love."

López Obrador has held a variety of nicknames throughout his life, including El Molido, El Americano (The American), La Piedra (The Rock), El Comandante (The Commander), and the most popular among them is El Peje, named after the common Tabasco fish, the pejelagarto.

A baseball fan, his favorite sportsteam is the St. Louis Cardinals.

López Obrador was named one of Time magazine's 100 Most Influential People of 2019.

On 24 January 2021, he announced that he had tested positive for COVID-19.

Early political career

Member of the PRI

He joined the PRI in 1976 to support Carlos Pellicer's campaign for a Senate seat for Tabasco. A year later, he headed the Indigenous People's Institute of Tabasco. In 1984, he relocated to Mexico City to work at the National Consumers' Institute, a federal government agency.

Member of the PRD

López Obrador resigned from his position with the government of Tabasco in 1988 to join the new dissenting left wing of the PRI, then called the Democratic Current, led by Cuauhtémoc Cárdenas. This movement formed the National Democratic Front and later became the Party of the Democratic Revolution (PRD).

In 1994, he ran for the governorship of Tabasco but lost to PRI candidate Roberto Madrazo. López Obrador gained national exposure as an advocate for the rights of indigenous people when, in 1996, he appeared on national TV drenched in blood following confrontations with police for blocking Pemex oil wells to defend the rights of local indigenous people impacted by pollution.

He was president of the PRD from 2 August 1996 to 10 April 1999.

Head of Government of the Federal District (2000–2005)

Election

On 2 July 2000, he was elected Head of Government of the Federal District, a position akin to that of city mayor for the national capital district, with 38.3% of the vote.

Political agenda

As mayor, López Obrador implemented various social programs that included extending financial assistance to help vulnerable groups in Mexico City, including single mothers, senior citizens, and the physically and mentally challenged. He invested in housing and schools, created old-age pensions, and expanded services. He also helped found the first new university in Mexico City in three decades, the Universidad Autónoma de la Ciudad de México.

López Obrador hired former New York City mayor Rudy Giuliani to craft a zero-tolerance policy that would help reduce crime in Mexico City.

He directed the restoration and modernization of Mexico City's historic downtown, which has 16th- and 17th-century buildings and many tourist spaces. He led a joint venture with billionaire businessman Carlos Slim Helú, a native of downtown Mexico City, to expropriate, restore, rebuild, and gentrify large parts of the area, creating shopping and residential areas for middle- and upper-income residents.

López Obrador used fiscal policy to encourage private sector investment in housing. He granted construction firms tax breaks and liberalized zoning regulations, leading to the construction of more condominiums and office buildings during his tenure than during any other period in Mexico City's history. New high-density condos emerged in the upscale neighborhoods of Polanco and Lomas de Chapultepec.

To improve traffic flow on the city's two main inner-city roads, Periférico and Viaducto, he added sections of second stories to the Anillo Periférico. He renovated about 10% of those roads. The Metrobús, an express bus service based on the Curitiba model, was built down Avenida Insurgentes, cutting through the city some 20 km from north to south.

Response to Tláhuac lynching

López Obrador's popularity diminished after the lynching of two federal law-enforcement officers performing an undercover investigation in Tláhuac in November 2004. The Mexico City Police rescued one agent, but the city's chief of police, Marcelo Ebrard, and federal Secretary of Public Safety, Ramón Martín Huerta, were both accused of not organizing a timely rescue effort. López Obrador's secretary of government, Alejandro Encinas, was criticized for declaring that the lynching should be understood as stemming from indigenous customary law (usos y costumbres). After a thorough investigation, López Obrador gave Ebrard a vote of confidence, despite a request from President Vicente Fox Quesada for him to be relieved of duty. Later, using his constitutional powers, Fox fired Ebrard. At the same time, Martín Huerta, a member of Fox's cabinet, received a reprimand and continued to hold office as Secretary of Public Safety until he died in a helicopter accident. López Obrador later appointed Ebrard as Secretary of Social Development and supported his candidacy in the PRD primaries to run for office as Head of Government of the Federal District in 2006.

Removal of his immunity from prosecution

Elected government officials in Mexico have an official immunity called fuero that prevents criminal charges from being brought against them, which can be removed through desafuero. In 2004, the Attorney General's Office asked Congress to strip López Obrador of his immunity under charges of a misdemeanor (ignoring a court order). The misdemeanor against López Obrador was his refusal to order the cessation of the construction of a private hospital on land expropriated by Rosario Robles (who preceded López Obrador as Head of Government of the Federal District under the Ernesto Zedillo government). Under federal law, any person with criminal charges during the electoral process would not be eligible to run in a presidential election. A legal process begun in 2004 would likely have continued during the presidential campaigns of 2006, ending López Obrador's presidential run.

Although his political opponents argued he should be subject to the same judicial process as anyone else, newspaper editorials throughout the world charged that the desafuero was politically motivated (including The New York Times and The Washington Post), that it undermined Mexican democracy, and that López Obrador's exclusion from the upcoming elections would delegitimize the eventual winner.

After Congress voted to remove López Obrador's immunity, he asked for leave from his post for a few days. President Vicente Fox, wanting to avoid a political crisis and knowing that the decision made by Congress was widely unpopular, appeared on national television in April 2005, stating that the issue would not be pursued further. The controversy closed on a technicality, and López Obrador, despite the removal of immunity, was not prosecuted and thus remained eligible to participate in the 2006 presidential election. Weeks later, Attorney General Rafael Macedo de la Concha resigned.

Public opinion at the end of his term

As Head of Government of the Federal District, López Obrador became one of the country's most recognizable politicians. He left office with an 84% approval rating, according to an opinion poll by Consulta Mitofsky. According to an article by Reforma newspaper, he kept 80% of the promises he made as a candidate.

Prior presidential campaigns

First presidential run, 2006

In September 2005, the PRD nominated López Obrador as presidential pre-candidate for the 2006 general election. Cuauhtémoc Cárdenas declined to participate in the internal elections when polls showed López Obrador as the clear favorite.

Until March 2006, polls showed him as the presidential frontrunner; however, his numbers had declined by late April. An article published by La Crónica de Hoy in March 2006 said that Mexican Bolivarian Circles and students, allegedly assisted by Venezuelan agents, distributed "Bolivarian propaganda in favor of Andrés Manuel López Obrador" throughout cities in Mexico and that such groups were given "economic support, logistics advice and ideological instruction" from the Hugo Chávez government.

Some left-wing politicians and analysts criticized López Obrador for including in his close staff many former members of the PRI who fought against his party in the 1980s and 1990s, such as Arturo Núñez (one of the authors of Fobaproa contingency fund), Manuel Camacho Solís and Marcelo Ebrard. The guerrilla leader of the Zapatista Army of National Liberation (EZLN), Subcomandante Marcos, said López Obrador was a false left-wing candidate, arguing that he was a centrist candidate. Cuauhtémoc Cárdenas did not participate in campaign events but stated that he would still vote for his party, the PRD.

López Obrador's proposals, including his 50 commitments, produced mixed opinions from analysts. The Washington Post wrote that López Obrador used U.S. President Franklin D. Roosevelt as inspiration for his proposals.

On 19 May, Roberto Madrazo, the PRI's presidential candidate, hinted at the possibility of an alliance with López Obrador to prevent National Action Party (PAN) candidate Felipe Calderón from winning the election after both parties criticized president Vicente Fox for what they saw as illegal support by the federal government for Calderón. A PRD spokesperson said both parties entered an information-sharing agreement regarding the issue. This, combined with calls from high-ranking PRI member Manuel Bartlett (former Secretary of the Interior during the 1988 presidential election fraud) to vote for López Obrador, aroused media speculation that the PRI and the PRD would ally.

On 28 May, after López Obrador discounted any such alliance because the PRI and PRD political tendencies could not be reconciled, Roberto Madrazo indicated that his comments were misunderstood and that he would not step down or endorse any other candidate.

In 2006, the Spanish newspaper El País criticized López Obrador for what it characterized as "extreme" verbal insults toward Mexican government institutions and President Vicente Fox.

Election results

On 6 July 2006, the Federal Electoral Institute (IFE) announced the final vote count in the 2006 presidential election, resulting in a narrow margin of 0.56 percentage points (243,934 votes) of victory for his opponent, Felipe Calderón. López Obrador appealed the results, claiming widespread irregularities, and demanded an election recount. (A generalized recount is only to be carried in extreme circumstances, according to Mexican Electoral Tribunal Jurisprudence S3ELJ14-2004.) On 8 July 2006, López Obrador called for nationwide protests to ask for a national recount, stating "the government would be responsible for any flare-up of anger after officials rejected his demand for a manual recount of Sunday's extremely close vote." However, on 5 September 2006, the Federal Electoral Tribunal (TEPJF) ruled that the election was fair and that Calderón was the winner and would become president.

In contesting the election, López Obrador and his coalition made several arguments: (a) that President Fox, the Consejo Coordinador Empresarial (CCE), a business interest group, and other organizations had illegally interfered in the presidential campaign, which is strictly prohibited by electoral law, thereby providing grounds for election annulment; that (b) that votes were fraudulently tallied on 2 July and afterward; and that (c) there was widespread and significant evidence of electoral irregularities, ranging from stuffed ballot boxes and inconsistent tally reports to improper and illegal handling of the ballot trail and voter intimidation.

The Court did find that President Fox and the CCE had interfered in the elections by campaigning for Felipe Calderón, which is against electoral laws. The Court ruled that both interferences could not be considered a sufficient judicial cause to annul the election. In response to fraud allegations, the Court stated there was insufficient evidence to annul the election.

López Obrador and his coalition had alleged irregularities in many polling stations and requested a national recount. Ultimately, the TEPJF, in a unanimous vote, ordered a recount of about 9% of the polling stations. The Supreme Court later ruled that the evidence presented did not demonstrate the occurrence of sufficient irregularities to change the election outcome.

In response to this result, in a move reminiscent of Francisco I. Madero declaring himself provisional President of Mexico after calling the 1910 elections against Porfirio Díaz fraudulent, López Obrador's followers proclaimed him the Presidente Legitimo (Legitimate President), inaugurated him in a ceremony in the Zócalo and called for the creation of an alternative, parallel government.

Post-election protests

López Obrador announced his victory to his supporters on the night of the election, stating that exit polls declared he had won by 500,000 votes. He did not cite any polls at the time and later referenced Covarrubias and IMO. Several days later, the Federal Electoral Institute (IFE) published its final tally, which had him down by a margin of 0.58%, or approximately 243,000 votes. López Obrador then initiated legal actions, claiming election irregularities in 54% of polling stations, and demanded a "vote by vote" recount in all polling stations.

The Federal Electoral Tribunal (TEPJF) discussed the case and eventually dismissed it. The IFE called for the candidates to refrain from proclaiming themselves as the winner, president-elect, or president until the final resolution. Both candidates disobeyed this call. In an interview with U.S. Spanish-language TV network Univision, López Obrador referred to himself as "President of Mexico."

López Obrador held several gatherings in downtown Mexico City, with hundreds of thousands attending. On 31 July, as an act of civil disobedience, he organized a blockade of 12 kilometers of Paseo de la Reforma, one of the city's most important roads, which houses several hotels, corporate headquarters, and the Mexico City Stock Market. Business groups said the blockades cost Mexico City businesses in the area millions of pesos in losses.

On 5 August, the TEPJF met in a public session to decide the outcome of the complaints the PRD and its coalition partners had filed. The seven magistrates voted unanimously to order a recount of 11,839 ballot boxes in 155 districts (9.2% of the total) despite López Obrador's public demand for a total recount. The TEPJF based its decision for a partial recount on its finding that, despite publicly demanding a vote-by-vote general recount, López Obrador's party filed legal challenges for 71,000 polling stations (54%). Therefore, by law, the TEPJF found it could order a recount of only those 71,000 polling stations contested. The TEPJF ruled it could not order a recount of the votes not in controversy because "the certainty asked by the Coalition is tied to the respect for the tallies certified by the citizens in the polling stations, not in controversy."

The TEPJF did certify that principles of certainty were grounds for a recount in some stations since there was evidence of possible irregularities. López Obrador rejected the resolution as too narrow, and he and his followers intensified their civil resistance. For about two hours on 9 August, protesters took over the tollbooths on four federal highways linking Mexico City to Cuernavaca, Querétaro, Toluca, and Pachuca. The protesters prevented personnel from charging tolls on some roads and allowed vehicles to pass freely. Also, hundreds of López Obrador supporters surrounded four of the main offices of foreign banks, including Citibank, Banamex, BBVA, and the Mexican subsidiary of HSBC, closing them for about four hours, claiming that foreign banks "ransack the country" and "widen the barrier between rich and poor" alleging banks had become involved in Mexican politics by supporting Calderón.

On 8 August, López Obrador sent a message to the press regarding the blockades, where he explained his reasons for continuing the "peaceful civil resistance." López Obrador held a rally called "National Democratic Convention" on 16 September, Independence Day, when a military parade was scheduled. The convention started after the military parade. Claiming he country's institutions to be colluded, López Obrador said that they "no longer work" and called for creating new ones.

López Obrador led a rally on the day of the State of the Union speech, where sympathizers prevented President Vicente Fox from delivering a speech inside the Legislative Palace of San Lázaro. They claimed that the President "had created a police state" in the area around Congress. They interpreted it as an unconstitutional act that made it impossible for Congress to be called into session. López Obrador told his followers not to be lured into violent confrontations with the police, declaring, "We aren't going to fall into any trap. We aren't going to be provoked." He urged his followers to remain in the Zócalo instead of marching to the Legislative Palace.

According to a poll published on 1 December 2006 in El Universal, 42% thought that Calderón's victory was fraudulent, and 46% thought it was not.

"Legitimate Presidency"

On 20 November 2006, during the federal holiday commemorating the Mexican Revolution, López Obrador's sympathizers proclaimed him the "Legitimate President" at a rally in the Zócalo in Mexico City. The action was planned in another rally, the "National Democratic Convention," in which supporters gave him the title. López Obrador called for the establishment of a parallel government and shadow cabinet at the convention.

After supporters proclaimed him as the "Legitimate President of Mexico," López Obrador created a "Cabinet of Denunciation" to protest actions made by President Felipe Calderón. In his speech at the proclamation ceremony, López Obrador promised to "procure the happiness of the people" and announced twenty "actions of government," such as fostering a process for renewal of public institutions and defending the right to information and demanding openness of communication media.

Days later, López Obrador announced that he would earn a salary of 50,000 pesos (US$2,500) a month, provided by donations.

Reactions

Reactions to the "legitimate presidency" varied widely. An opinion by El País said that López Obrador's "lack of consideration for democratic institutions and the rule of law seriously endanger civil peace in Mexico." After speculation on whether or not López Obrador's self-proclamation was against the law, the PRI stated that this political action was not a crime. Liébano Sáenz, chief of staff of former President Ernesto Zedillo, said López Obrador "will become the conscience of the nation, which will do much good for Mexican democracy." José Raúl Vera López, the Roman Catholic bishop of Saltillo, Coahuila, declared that the so-called "legitimate presidency" was a result of the "profound discontent with how the country has been run" and that López Obrador had "very deep moral backing."

A poll by Grupo Reforma indicated that 56% of Mexicans disapproved of López Obrador taking the title, while only 19% approved. Sixty-three percent of those polled said the former candidate had lost credibility. Other responses in the poll included 82% describing the political atmosphere in Mexico as "tense," 45% of those polled blamed it on the PRD, 20% blamed it on the PAN, and 25% blamed both parties. The poll was a telephone survey of 850 adults on 18 November with 95% confidence interval of +/-3.4% margin of error.

In the first few months of his term, President Calderón announced initiatives that mirrored López Obrador's initiatives. These included price ceilings for tortillas through the Tortilla Price Stabilization Pact, that protected small corn producers, reductions to the president and cabinet minister salaries, and the proposal for a constitutional amendment that, if passed, would have lowered wages for public servants and impose caps on their remuneration. Some interpreted this measures as "seeking to fulfill a campaign promise to incorporate the agenda of election rival Andrés Manuel López Obrador into his government." Others saw them as intending to undercut the opposition government.

Occupation of Congress

Congress was also taken by legislators of the Broad Progressive Front (FAP), the PRD, Labor, and Convergence parties on 10 April 2008 because they disagreed with the Government regarding energy policy discussions, claiming they were unconstitutional. López Obrador's followers, using chairs and tables and barricades, took both chambers of Congress and had them chained, thus avoiding the passage of secondary laws which modified the legal framework of the Mexican state-owned oil company, Pemex. López Obrador and his followers opposed these laws and viewed them as leading to the de facto privatization of the company. López Obrador requested a four-month debate on energy policies instead of the 50-day one presented by the PAN, PRI, Green Party and New Alliance.

Second presidential run, 2012

López Obrador ran again as the PRD, Labor Party, and Citizens' Movement candidate under the coalition Movimiento Progresista in the 2012 presidential election.

Political proposals

Economic proposals

In November 2011, López Obrador announced some of his economic proposals:

• Job creation: A sustained 6% growth rate to generate the new 1.2 million jobs needed each year.
• Austerity: Reducing salaries of government officials and unnecessary spending, saving around US$30 billion a year.
• Progressive fiscal reforms: López Obrador said the people who make less should pay a smaller percentage of taxes than those who make more money.
• No new taxes or increases on existing taxes: López Obrador plans to focus on ending fiscal privileges.
• Competition: End monopolies; any private citizen who wants to participate in media, television, and telephony should be able to.

Security policy

López Obrador had been a firm critic of Felipe Calderón's crime strategy and promised to reduce military presence on the streets, offering reparations to victims of the Mexican Drug War and emphasizing the protection of human rights in the country. López Obrador proposed a single police command that would gradually assume the activities of the Mexican Navy and the Mexican Army, as well as a single intelligence agency to tackle the financial networks of criminal organizations. The new police force would promote "civic and moral values." He promised to increase the salaries and benefits given to law enforcement officials throughout Mexico. His security strategy comprised ten proposals, but all of them had the main theme: organized crime cannot be tackled if the government is responsible for the erosion of human rights.

He also stated that if elected, he would reject any intelligence activity from the United States, including money and weapons in aid. This policy would stop the operations in Mexico of the Central Intelligence Agency and the Drug Enforcement Administration, including the use of drones. But it could also discourage U.S. aid to Mexico (US$1.6 billion since 2008). The proposal intended to appeal to discontent over U.S. actions in "Operation Fast and Furious," where ATF agents were involved in a gun-walking scandal.

López Obrador promised to reactivate the economy and social growth, so more people could have access to a "better life" without joining cartels and abandoning the rule of law. He also pledged to improve the education system and create more jobs before the criminal groups can recruit them. He also spoke of taming corruption, impunity, drug consumption, addiction, and elite privileges. The security Cabinet he proposed would work directly with the municipal and state forces in a unified command.

López Obrador summed up his security policy as "Abrazos, no balazos" (Hugs, not bullets). At the start of his campaign, he said he would remove Mexican Army personnel from the streets. Still, in May 2012, it stated that the military would continue to operate until Mexico had a "trained, skilled and moralized police force."

Proposed cabinet

López Obrador announced a tentative cabinet. Among them were:

• Marcelo Ebrard as Secretary of the Interior
• Rogelio Ramírez de la O as Secretary of the Treasury
• Juan Ramón de la Fuente as Secretary of Education
• Claudia Sheinbaum Pardo as Secretary of the Environment
• Javier Jiménez Espriú as Secretary of Communications and Transportation
• Fernando Turner as Secretary of Economic Development
• Adolfo Hellmund López as Secretary of Energy
• René Drucker Colín as Secretary of Science and Technology
• Elena Poniatowska as Secretary of Culture
• Héctor Vasconcelos as Secretary of Foreign Affairs

Election results

The election was won by Enrique Peña Nieto of the PRI, with 38.2%, to 31.6% for López Obrador. López Obrador did not accept the preliminary results, as most votes had not been counted. Subsequently, he claimed vote buying and other irregularities and demanded a full recount by the Federal Electoral Institute (IFE). The IFE found irregularities but confirmed the results on 6 July. López Obrador rejected this announcement and filed a complaint to invalidate the election. He alleged vote-buying, spending above election regulations, illegal fundraising, and vote fraud. On 30 August, the Electoral Tribunal of the Federal Judiciary formally rejected his complaint.

Peña Nieto vote-buying controversy

At a news conference, López Obrador claimed that the election was "plagued with irregularities" and accused the PRI of vote buying. He also claimed that the PRI handed out gifts to lure voters into casting their vote for that party with the cooperation of Soriana, a retail chain. On the day of the 2012 presidential elections, people who voted for the PRI would receive pre-paid gift cards. Nonetheless, the PRI and the store denied those accusations and threatened to sue López Obrador. Peña Nieto vowed to imprison anyone – including members of the PRI – if they were found guilty of electoral fraud. Despite Peña Nieto's statement, videos by citizens about the Soriana cards surfaced on the internet.

Creation of MORENA political party

Following the 2012 presidential election loss, López Obrador told a rally in Mexico City's Zócalo on 9 September 2012 that he would withdraw from the Democratic Revolution Party "on the best of terms." He said he was working on founding a new party from the Movement for National Regeneration ("Movimiento de Regeneración Nacional" in Spanish), or MORENA, for its acronym in Spanish. A couple of days after his departure from the PRD, federal deputy Ricardo Monreal stated it was a "divorce for convenience," and that López Obrador did the most responsible thing to avoid polarization of the country. According to polls and surveys, in 2012 most of the Mexican public had a negative view of the establishment of MORENA as a political party. On 7 January 2014, Martí Batres, president of MORENA, presented the documentation to the INE to be acknowledged political party.

In 2014, López Obrador revealed why he left the PRD, stating, "I left the PRD because the leaders of that party betrayed the people, they went with Peña Nieto and approved the Pact for Mexico, which is nothing more than a Pact against Mexico. I can not be in a party where tax increases were approved, and it was approved that they would increase the price of gasoline every month. Gasoline in Mexico costs more than in the United States, the salary in Mexico is the lowest in the entire North American continent, and instead of asking for wage increases, the PRD rose to the podium to ask for an increase in the price of gasoline, it's an embarrassment." After Cuauhtémoc Cárdenas criticized him for forming his political party, on 7 July 2014, López Obrador posted on social media that, "PRD leaders and most of its legislators voted for the fiscal reforms and with their collaboration they paved the way for privatization of the oil industry." On 10 July 2014, the INE approved MORENA as an official political party to receive federal funds and participate in the 2015 legislative elections.

2018 presidential campaign

López Obrador participated again in the 2018 presidential election, his third presidential run. In the election, he represented MORENA, the left-wing Labor Party (PT), and the socially conservative right-wing Social Encounter Party (PES) under the coalition Juntos Haremos Historia. Pre-election polls indicated he had a double-digit lead over candidates Ricardo Anaya, José Antonio Meade, and Jaime Rodríguez Calderón.

In 2018, the Mexican publication Aristegui Noticias criticized Vicente Fox for what it characterized as "extreme" verbal insults on Twitter towards López Obrador's crackdown on institutional corruption.

Juntos Haremos Historia

Background

On 24 June 2017, the PT agreed to fight the 2018 election in an electoral alliance with MORENA; however, the coalition had not officially registered with the National Electoral Institute (INE), the country's electoral authority. For MORENA, the alliance consolidated after the withdrawal of the PT's candidate Óscar González Yáñez, who resigned his candidacy and called for votes in favor of Delfina Gómez Álvarez, the standard-bearer in the state elections of the State of Mexico in 2017.

In October 2017, at PT's National Congress, as party president Alberto Anaya was reelected to another 6-year term, PT formalized its coalition with MORENA.

At first, there was speculation about the possibility of a front grouping all the left-wing parties: MORENA, the PRD, PT, and the MC. However, López Obrador rejected any agreement due to political differences, especially after the 2017 State of Mexico elections, where the candidates of the PRD and MC continued with their campaigns and refused to support the MORENA candidate. At the end of November 2017, the leaders of MORENA and the PES announced that they were in talks to form a possible alliance: Hugo Eric Flores Cervantes, president of the PES, said: "We don't negotiate with the PRI, we have two options, go alone or with MORENA."

Confirmation

On 13 December 2017, PES joined the coalition between MORENA and the PT, and it was formalized under the name Juntos Haremos Historia (Together We Will Make History). Following the signing of the agreement, López Obrador was appointed as a pre-candidate for the three political groups. It was a partial coalition that supported López Obrador as the presidential candidate and divided the legislative elections between the three: MORENA chose candidates in 150 federal electoral districts (out of 300) and 32 Senate rates, while the PT and the PES each nominated 75 candidates for the Chamber of Deputies and 16 for the Senate.

The alliance received criticism as it was a coalition between two left-wing parties (MORENA and the PT) with a formation related to the evangelical right (PES). In response, MORENA national president Yeidckol Polevnsky said that her party "believes in inclusion and teamwork to rescue Mexico" and that they will continue to defend human rights; in turn, Hugo Eric Flores Cervantes, national president of the PES, said that "the only possibility of real change in our country is the one headed by Andrés Manuel López Obrador" and that his party had decided to be "on the right side of history".

Andrés Manuel López Obrador said this would be his last attempt to become president, rejecting the idea of becoming a permanent moral leader for the Mexican left-wing.

International solidarity

In Paris, France, there is the "Official French Committee of MORENA", on which several occasions have presented their support to the candidate in small rallies in that European country. In February 2018, French deputy and former presidential candidate Jean-Luc Mélenchon, founder of the La France Insoumise party, met with López Obrador, before the official start of the electoral campaign in Mexico, and described his possible victory in the following terms: "If they manage to thwart the plans against them and win the elections, it will be a great change for Mexico and all of Latin America."

Miguel Ángel Revilla, president of the Autonomous Community of Cantabria, Spain, mentioned López Obrador in an interview on the El Hormiguero program, where he spoke of the possibility of victory for the presidential candidate in 2018: "I think he's going to win because Mexico needs a change to a good person because they are presenting him as a Chávez-type populist, or Fidel Castro-type, but really, because he wants to end corruption and inequality within what he can do because the country does not deserve what it has until now; I want to send my support to this man, Andrés Manuel López Obrador, from here."

López Obrador has been referred to as the "ideological twin" of the US's progressive leader Bernie Sanders and the UK's Labour Party leader, Jeremy Corbyn, the latter having visited López Obrador and invited him over to the British Parliament.

Proposed Cabinet

In December 2017, López Obrador presented his proposed cabinet:

• Olga Sánchez Cordero as Secretary of the Interior
• Héctor Vasconcelos as Secretary of Foreign Affairs
• Carlos Manuel Urzúa Macías as Secretary of Finance
• Maria Luisa Albores as Secretary of Social Development
• Josefa González Blanco Ortiz Mena as Secretary of Environment
• Rocío Nahle as Secretary of Energy
• Graciela Márquez Colín as Secretary of Economy
• Esteban Moctezuma Barragán as Secretary of Education
• Víctor Villalobos as Secretary of Agriculture
• Javier Jiménez Espriú as Secretary of Communications
• Irma Eréndira Sandoval as Secretary of the Civil Service
• Jorge Alcocer Varela as Secretary of Health
• Luisa María Alcalde Luján as Secretary of Labor
• Román Meyer Falcón as Secretary of Agrarian Development and Urban Planning
• Miguel Torruco Marqués as Secretary of Tourism
• Alejandra Frausto Guerrero as Secretary of Culture

Replacements

• It was announced on 5 July 2018 that Héctor Vasconcelos would be replaced at Foreign Affairs by Marcelo Ebrard, following Vasconcelos's election to the Senate.
• Arturo Herrera replaced Carlos Manuel Urzúa Macías at Finance on 10 July 2019.
• Víctor Manuel Toledo replaced Josefa González Blanco Ortíz Mena as Minister of Environment and Natural Resources on 25 May 2019.

Political positions during campaign

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