What Happened to the Mexican Right?

Dear all,

We welcome you to the Greater Caribbean Monitor (GCaM). In this issue, you will find:

•What Happened to the Mexican Right? A Conversation with Alicia Galván

•Gangs in Chiapas Foster Immigration to Guatemala

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The GCaM Team

•What Happened to the Mexican Right? A Conversation with Alicia Galván
1,056 words | 5 minutes reading time

Alicia Galván is a Mexican lawyer and political activist. In this interview, she analyzes her country’s current state of affairs, assessing why right-wingers in Mexico have failed to meet the challenge posed by Morena, outgoing President Andrés Manuel López Obrador’s now-hegemonic political party. The opinions expressed herein are entirely hers.

What is happening to the rightin Mexico? Has it hit rock bottom after the recent presidential election?

Yes, unfortunately, it has hit rock bottom. But I believe that if we reach a point where there is unity and strategic cooperation between private and public institutions that still share certain conservative principles, we can go from there and begin structuring a conservative movement.

There are many institutions that currently work in favor of the principles that any conservative defends: freedom, life, and family. However, there has been a lack of vision at a social and structural level, as well as in transmitting these convictions to the electorate. I believe we saw this reflected in the last elections. To me, it seemed incredible that the opposition candidate, nominated by the party associated with traditional values, ​​had already abandoned those principles about 10 years ago. [The opposition alliance] nominated a socialist candidate with progressive values, but the most worrying thing is that the conservative electorate accepted her even though she did not represent them, chiefly because their top priority was to oust Morena.

In the end, citizens were more pragmatic than political parties. The opposition tried to put in a progressive candidate thinking that she would attract that vote. That didn’t happen. On the contrary, it only served to alienate the archconservative vote it had always relied on. With the PAN’s shift to the left, Mexican right-wingers have been left politically orphaned.

Is a new political party necessary? Or can the PAN be rescued by taking advantage of its structure, history, and tradition?

In politics, gaps are eventually filled. The path may involve a new political party—although, frankly, not any time soon. A conservative political party could not be firmly established until 2031. Electoral rules in Mexico are complicated; one cannot create a national political party overnight. Moreover, in view of the number of signatures Eduardo Verástegui obtained in his attempt at running as an independent, it’s obvious that for now the strength necessary to consolidate a new political party does not exist.

Ideally, we would rescue the PAN, although I view this as a complicated undertaking. Opportunities will arise in the next six months. Currently, there is much talk of “returning to the roots,” but well, speeches and words are nice, yet most of the time they vanish into thin air. We will have to see how they act in the new legislature through the bills presented and the votes for some of Morena’s reforms. Only in this way will it be possible to verify if there really is a commitment to return to that conservative position. I would like to be positive, but at Patria Unida we tend to be very realistic and objective. It’s complicated, but I believe that the path is found through certain local actors that still defend our principles with great zeal.

Would you admit that AMLO is the politician who knows Mexico best?

Of course, that is why he managed to reach the presidency with such a number of votes. Besides, after six years in government with poor results, Morena’s candidate secured a landslide. He does well; he’s a man who spent 18 years visiting every municipality in Mexico. He understood the common people’s wishes and knew what to promise. I will say one thing: Andrés Manuel López Obrador needs to be studied in depth; nobody achieves a movement of 80 million people in six years.

Can AMLO be reclaimed by the right?

Yes, AMLO understood the country’s level of poverty; he walked alongside them [the poor] and spoke to them. He understood that the country’s poor were necessary to his movement. As a result, he reformed many welfare programs that had been introduced by previous PAN and PRI governments. These were subsidiary and temporary schemes that were intended to help these people move forward, and AMLO converted them into a human right at the constitutional level, all with the support of the PAN and the PRI.

Today, 30 million Mexicans receive government stipends merely for being women or “NEETS,” i.e. not working or studying. How can one compete against a party that is directly paying its voters? Instead of betting on forming a citizenry based on meritocracy, effort, and hard work, many prefer not to work and simply rely on welfare. The opposition, instead of presenting a meritocratic, investment-centric economic plan, simply promised to give away more money. Thus, in my view, AMLO understands the country’s predicament and is very good at communicating and deceiving. For the last six years, he has been able to set the country’s narrative and agenda.

What is Mexico? Has it become a progressive country?

We often wish to understand Mexico as a city, and that logically takes you to the capital, but Mexico is actually a continent unto itself. People in the north do not live life the same way as people in the south or the Bajío [central lowlands]. Furthermore, Mexico City is the origin and cradle of Mexican progressivism; we have imported the worst of Europe and the worst of the United States. However, I believe that understanding Mexico implies knowing that it is a country of more than 120 million people, of which 50 million live in poverty, and of those, a little over 10% live in extreme poverty. Those people don’t really care about left or right. We cannot demand that they study and analyze what is behind each public policy; sadly, they do not know what a public policy is. These are people who wake up at dawn to work hard for eight or 10 hours to try to bring food to their children, who in turn can’t go to school because they also need to work to satisfy their basic needs. That’s Mexico.

The current cultural war, as well as the advent of progressivism, has come from the middle and upper classes. These are people who have their lives figured out and can follow global fashions. The lower classes, in my view, are still cultural conservatives, but this is changing because the culture war extends to music, novels, television, and radio.

•Gangs in Chiapas Foster Immigration to Guatemala
643 words | 3 minutes reading time

Chiapas is at the epicenter of a war raging between narcos and gangs, who seek to dominate the twin industries of drug trafficking and migrant smuggling.

Overview. 2024 has seen an increase in the number of Mexican migrants, some of them trekking not north, but south. During the Guatemalan Civil War, many Guatemalans sought refuge in Mexico. Now, migrants from the Mexican border state of Chiapas seek to escape the territorial squabbles between drug traffickers and gang members, leaving for Huehuetenango, in northern Guatemala.

• The inter-cartel war in Chiapas has been raging since 2021, when the Jalisco New Generation Cartel (CJNG) announced it planned to pry the state from the Sinaloa Cartel’s hands. 

• In the past few weeks alone, around 600 Chiapas residents have left for Guatemala, where they have been granted temporary residence permits. 

Data. Mexican President Andrés Manuel López Obrador’s policy of “hugs, not bullets” (abrazos, no balazos) has been largely ineffective, leading to an uptick in crime in Mexico. This has spread to states like Chiapas, where the long-running dominance of a single cartel had kept violence at relatively low levels. In light of this shift, Chiapas recorded 631 homicides in 2023, the second-highest rate in its history, only behind 2018. 

• Murders continue increasing. The first quarter of 2024 saw a 53% uptick compared to the same period last year.

• In the eight months preceding August, Chiapas recorded 529 homicides in 212 days—an average of 2.5 per day—with 55 in January, 66 in February, 89 in March, 93 in April, 81 in May, 84 in June, and 61 in July.

• The state broke the national record for homicides, with 22 on June 30 alone.

Between the Lines. Chiapas, located on the border with Guatemala, is one of the key points along the drug route from South America to the United States. Drug traffickers have also dabbled in the migrant trade, which is considered by some analysts to be even more lucrative than drugs, especially once its lower risk is taken into account.

• The Sinaloa Cartel charges migrants a minimum fee of $100 to traverse its “territory.” Some 712,226 migrants have entered Mexico since January, generating at least $71 million in profits for the cartels.

• According to the U.S. House of Representatives’ Committee on Homeland Security, it is estimated that cartels earned $13 billion smuggling migrants in 2021 alone.

• The Mexican Refugee Commission registered a record of 140,982 refugee applications in 2023. 55% of them came from Tapachula, Chiapas.

Seen and Unseen. The phenomenon has worsened in light of Salvadoran President Nayib Bukele’s war against gangs in El Salvador. Although the Mara Salvatrucha (MS-13) and Barrio 18 gangs have historically traveled through Chiapas, their presence in the region has become more prominent after their banishment from El Salvador. In June, MS-13 and Barrio 18 graffiti was sighted in the outskirts of Tapachula. 

• In February 2024, two members of MS-13—both wanted by the Salvadoran government—were arrested in Tapachula.

• The Chiapas Prosecutor’s Office has said these gang members were seeking to establish themselves at the Mexico-Guatemala border, from which they intended to direct their operations and recruit new members.

• Chiapas authorities have opened 122 cases against MS-13 and Barrio 18 gang members. Between January and September 2022, 148 gang members were arrested in the same state. More than one-third were from El Salvador.

On the Radar. According to InSight Crime, the increase in extortion in southern Mexico is an indication of the migration of gang members, who are swelling the ranks of once-small Mexican gangs. In Chiapas, the gangs have adapted their modus operandi, variously collaborating as the operational arm of the CJNG and the Sinaloa Cartel. 

• Chiapas residents now suffer from Salvadoran gangs’ traditional financing mechanism: the collection of “rent.” Central American gangs in the region are also diversifying their lines of business.

• At least 30% of coffee producers in the Sierra Madre de Chiapas had to abandon their crops in 2023, mostly as a result of gangs’ extortion efforts.