Jalisco election results signal major shift in Mexican politics

Pedro Kumamoto led a tireless grassroots campaign to become the first independent candidate elected to the Jalisco state congress.

Preliminary counts indicate that President Enrique Peña Nieto’s Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI) is on course to retain a slim majority in the federal congress after Sunday’s midterm elections, but results in several local contests have shown that cracks are beginning to form in Mexico’s political establishment.

Jaime “El Bronco” Rodríguez was widely hailed for becoming the nation’s first independent governor by claiming the northern state of Nuevo León, although his outsider credentials have been questioned, because he previously served in the PRI for 30 years and unsuccessfully sought the party’s candidacy ahead of this year’s elections.

Arguably the most surprising and significant results came in the western state of Jalisco, where two relatively new political forces focused on enhancing transparency and civic engagement won historic victories…

Click here to read this article in full at Latin Correspondent.