The pre-campaign closures repeat what was said before and perhaps hint at the candidates' concerns about what will come in the electoral campaign, which begins on March 1 on the way to the polls on June 2.
This is how Claudia Sheinbaum's speech on Thursday night focused on the successes of the government and the Morenoist slogans, the poor, the people, honesty, while the opposition Xóchitl Gálvez articulated the harangue to the tripartite followers, the Sunday at its early closing in Mexico City, regarding the insecurity and fear that the country is experiencing.
A theme that ruled again at this Thursday's event in Guanajuato, a rally with less vigor but where the focus was also on violence: "I am going to confront crime, I have the guts to let them live in peace."
On both occasions, Gálvez lavished light invocations on the economy,
vade retro
, which these days shows the greatest Mexican strength in decades, something that she herself recognized: it is urgent to “take advantage,” that is what she said, “take advantage of the best opportunity in decades to bring investments to Mexico.”
It seemed like an own goal.
Violence and fear in the country are winning tricks for the opposition, which is all the more reason why Sheinbaum barely mentioned that chapter as one of the axes of the policy that promises: “Maintain,” that is what he said, “maintain peace and security.” .
There is little peace to maintain, rather guarantee it.
Omar García Harfuch, right behind the candidate, stole the close-ups during the event.
The image of the former police chief perhaps tried to compensate for the great fragility that Morena presents in these elections, the issue of incessant violence.
The two women with options to compete for the presidency gave another example of what the campaign will be like, if nothing changes.
“The most chingona”, as Gálvez was presented, shouted and encouraged her people moving around the stage of the Arena México and invoked face to face with Sheinbaum through the already repeated allusions to the moderate electoral profile of the morenista candidate, eclipsed, says the opposition, by the figure of the big boss, President López Obrador: “If they give you permission, Mrs. Sheinbaum, we will see you in the debates,” challenged the blue and white.
She insisted on fighting her opponent: “Claudia wants Mexicans to conform, I think you deserve more.
Claudia Sheinbaun does not want the poor to stop being poor, because she does not understand Mexico, she comes from privilege, I from effort, she has always lived well off the budget, from yellow envelopes;
I do know what it's like to not make it to the fortnight, I know what it's like to risk my savings in a company, to create employment, she doesn't know it, and that's why we're going to win."
But the arrows of the opposition continue to collide with the cold shield of the Morenoist candidate, who does not enter the rag.
The “entrona” shakes the ball like a cat, but the ball does not return the play.
That is where the campaign will go if the former head of government of the capital does not change her registration.
At the end of her campaign, not a bad word against her opponent;
not a word, in short.
The opposition is going to despair if the Morenista locks herself in her camp.
And the temptation is logical.
Sheinbaum's men move with leaden feet before entering into melee.
“They are leaving, they are leaving the Government,” Xóchitl shouted to his people.
But they haven't left, nor does it seem like they will.
Sheinbaum declared herself the winner of the presidency and awarded Morena a qualified majority in Congress, the party's great effort.
As long as the polls show the enormous difference that still separates them, it is difficult for Sheinbaum to give air with diatribes to an opposition that has not quite taken off.
The Morenistas behaved as a compact block.
They staged the unity of the party by bringing friends and enemies to the presidium: there was no shortage of former chancellor and former candidate Marcelo Ebrard, very close to Sheinbaum;
also the former Secretary of the Interior, Adán Augusto López, the former prosecutor Ernestina Godoy and all the others.
“Long live Mexico, long live President López Obrador, long live the Fourth Transformation,” Sheinbaum concluded.
The Morenoist package conjures up the cracks.
Only the opposition enjoyed the supposed unity on Sunday in Mexico City.
Gálvez, the name around which the PAN, the PRI and the PRD are allied, went ahead to the close of the campaign in a comfortable fiefdom for the candidate, where the followers of the three parties supported her in droves.
As on other occasions, she praised the values of each formation, “the democratic mystique and civic commitment of the PAN, the experience and knowledge of the PRI and the vocation for social justice and perseverance of the PRD.”
But the divisions and setbacks of the allies are significantly hindering Xóchitl's campaign and she knows it: “Let's leave the division and hatred behind.
Unity, love and harmony,” she called for at her capital rally on Saturday.
There is no way.
This Thursday in Acámbaro, press officials presented the meeting as “part of their closing campaign.”
Had it been the definitive closure it would have been lackluster, because only the PAN members accompanied her in Guanajuato.
Another thing is the capital, where everyone predicted a better future for her as a candidate for head of Government if she had not jumped to the presidential poster.
The same divisions overshadow the third player in the fray, Movimiento Ciudadano, which closed its pre-campaign in Nuevo León, the same place where the candidacy of Jorge Álvarez Máynez, supported by the fallen Samuel García, started.
At this event, the absence of the governor of Jalisco, Enrique Alfaro, thundered, who did not appear, upset with the party for how it has handled the designation of the presidential candidate.
All in all, Máynez fought in good rally tone with his followers.
He brought out “the old politics”, the “
phospho phospho
”, also the insecurity, and distributed praise left and right: to the leader of the party, Dante Delgado, to Luis Donaldo Colosio and the couple from New Leon with great emphasis on Mariana Cantú .
He also mentioned “the economic prosperity” of Jalisco.
That's as far as unity goes in this party that champions a “new Mexico”: “The old politics thought that by removing Samuel, the Citizen Movement would not have a presidential candidate,” Máynez became emboldened, microphone in hand and without papers.
For Gálvez, the screens that surrounded her on Sunday in the capital showed her speech word by word and Sheinbaum, refractory to rallies, read hers the old-fashioned way, in academic pages, in the lee of the lectern.
Citizens will vote for these elections by not being great political speakers, but that is not all that is expected of them.
The two candidates presented their values and the country they pursue: education, health, well-paid employment, similar speeches, one from criticism, the other from government experience.
But the personal matters in the campaign too.
Xóchitl brought out his children, his indigenous origins and the fight for women.
Claudia introduced herself as “woman, mother, grandmother, scientist and humanist.”
You already know them.
Now, you have to choose.
Follow the campaign.
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