Institutional Revolutionary Party Senator Beatriz Paredes Rangel. Photo: Google

By KELIN DILLON

In a new interview with daily Mexican newspaper El Universal, Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI) Senator Beatriz Paredes Rangel publicized her confidence that she will win the opposition’s internal race for the Broad Front for Mexico’s presidential candidate in Mexico’s 2024 elections, refuting President Andrés Manuel López Obrador’s (AMLO) claims that the opposition has already chosen National Action Party (PAN) Senator Xóchitl Gálvez as its candidate behind closed doors.

“I am going to win this process, I am determined, I have worked for it,” Paredes told El Universal. “I have the right organization, the support of many sympathizers and various organizations, and of course I deeply respect all the participants, who in principle are my co-religionists, and those who are from other parties and from civil society.”

When prompted about the Broad Front for Mexico, a collaboration between the Va por México electoral coalition and civil organizations for the 2024 elections that’s been fraught with internal contention from its inception, Paredes said that “I need to know the program of the Broad Front for Mexico, as I am a person who moves based on purposes and projects.”

“This is an unprecedented process: the construction of a Broad Front for Mexico, where parties that have very different histories and have been antagonistic for many decades in the history of Mexico participate together, which requires high-level political skills and abilities that must be demonstrated,” continued Paredes.

Paredes went on to comment on López Obrador’s public assertion that Gálvez has already been chosen as opposition’s presidential candidate despite the fact that the Broad Front for Mexico’s decision is not set to be announced until Sept. 3, saying that “we have to be very responsible to know that if this process is discredited, we are dealing a blow to the democratic evolution of our country.”

“It seems to me that the president should already have the internal election of National Regeneration Movement (Morena) to entertain himself,” the PRI senator told the paper. “I have the possibility of meeting the requirements that have been proposed to gather the required  number of signatures, I am going to participate with great enthusiasm in the internal election, I am at the top in several of the polls, so I do not know where the president got a magic ball from. You better tell us who is going to be Morena’s candidate. That you surely know.”

As for Gálvez, Paredes had nothing negative to say about her fellow aspiring opposition presidential candidate, though made sure to note she felt the PAN senator would be better suited to run for governorship of Mexico City, which is also up for election in 2024.

“It seems to me that she is an attractive media figure and I think that she is a person who was very well targeted towards Mexico City,” said Paredes. “I think that her experience is very solid. Let’s see how she continues on his way.”

Paredes concluded her interview by commenting on the resignation of four senators from the PRI’s electoral block in the Mexican Senate, saying that “I always regret when some people leave the PRI, I don’t like turncoats” while conceding that “this senate has been very peculiar, and the truth is that all the benches have been blurred with divisions at some point.”