Mexico Is Likely to Elect Its First Woman President This Weekend

Mexicans on Sunday are likely to elect their first woman president in a historic election that has centered around surging violence.

Why it matters: The new leader of Mexico, the U.S.' biggest trading partner, could make or break bilateral collaborations that have helped stem the flow of northbound migration.

• Yet while immigration has been a top concern in the upcoming U.S. elections, it's been rarely mentioned in Mexico's presidential race, signaling internal concerns trump the issue. [...]

Zoom in: The two leading presidential candidates are Claudia Sheinbaum from the ruling Morena coalition and Xóchitl Gálvez, a former senator from the opposition coalition called Fuerza y Corazón por México.

• Sheinbaum, who is leading in the polls, is a scientist and formerly the leader of Mexico City's government.
• Her proposals to stem violence largely mirror those of her mentor, López Obrador, who created the National Guard and gave it significant power over public safety while also promoting his famous "hugs, not bullets" mantra.
• She's also promised to create a new national criminal investigations program to tackle impunity (more than 98% of crimes go unpunished or unsolved in Mexico).

Gálvez, an engineer, has pledged to build a new maximum security prison, invest in forensics and strengthen the justice system, and to keep the National Guard deployed in key areas but make it civilian-led.

• Trailing them is Jorge Álvarez Maynez of centrist party Movimiento Ciudadano.

What they're saying: "There's a lot at stake bilaterally in many aspects," says Carin Zissis, editor in chief of Americas Society/Council of the Americas.

• "And while migration has not been a huge campaign issue in Mexico… it's hard to think that it won't be a big challenge that both the next Mexican president and the next occupant of the White House will need to handle" preferably jointly, Zissis adds...

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