SCJN President Norma Piña. Photo: SCJN

By KELIN DILLON

On Monday, Feb. 10, Mexico’s  Electoral Tribunal of the Judicial Branch of the Federation (TEPJF) announced that it had requested four members of the Supreme Court of Justice of the Nation (SCJN) to abstain from voting on the suspension of Mexico’s upcoming popular judicial elections, due to having already publicly expressed their opinions on the matter to the media.

The SCJN vote, scheduled for Thursday, Feb. 13, will attempt to resolve the disparities between the TEPJF and district judges’ previous rulings on the judicial elections – and could potentially give any judge in the nation the power to stop the voting process. 

The four ministers include SCJN President Norma Piña, Alfredo Gutiérrez Ortiz Mena, Javier Laynez and Jorge Mario Pardo.

According to the TEPJF, Piña and Pardo “carried out activism work around the judicial reform” and attended demonstrations against the initiative.

“With such actions by President Minister Norma Piña and Minister Pardo Rebolledo, it is once again evident that their mood is partially affected by one of the groups that make up the dispute they are about to resolve,” said the TEPJF. “Therefore, to guarantee the objectivity and impartiality that must prevail in the case, we respectfully request that the corresponding declaration of impediment be made and that they excuse themselves from knowing these powers.”

As for Laynez and Ortiz Mena, the TEPJF said the two ministers publicly stated their opinion on the judicial reform across various interviews.

“They have openly spoken out against this election and even one of them, in the media, called himself an activist,” said the TEPJF’s presiding judge, Monica Soto.

For his part, National Regeneration Movement (Morena) member and Senate President Gerardo Fernández Noroña expressed his support for the TEPJF’s request for the four ministers to recuse themselves from voting, saying that “they are determined that the election should not take place and, therefore, they should not be involved in a matter in which they have an obvious and absolute interest.”

However, despite this, Fernández Noroña also said he believes the four ministers will ignore the request and continue to cast their votes during Thursday’s SCJN session.