Advertisement benefiting Claudia Sheinbaum and Marcelo Ebrard in Tijuana and Toluca, respectively. cuartoscuro
Meetings, tours, fence painting, spectacular announcements, attacks and disqualifications. Morenas Corcholatas, as those seeking presidential nominations are known colloquially, have stepped on the accelerator to put their names on the ballot for the 2024 election. The first two weeks of the competition have brought in 2.7 million pesos, according to the party. The participants themselves have reported to the ruling party’s leadership. This figure is limited only to the four candidates of Andrés Manuel López Obrador’s political institute and has aroused suspicion among the candidates in a scenario of mutual mistrust where control was exercised by the Morenista leadership itself. Expense reports, failures in the use of resources and disagreements over the issue of funding the internal process have also been fully apparent since the beginning of the campaign.
Morena presented the first bi-weekly breakdown of spending into four main items: logistics, transport, per diems and accommodation. From this it can be deduced that the most “expensive” bottle cap is licensed Senator Ricardo Monreal, having spent more than 916,000 pesos to launch his campaign, almost a fifth of the five million that the party leadership has allocated to each candidate for the entire phase of the stretches , which ends at the end of August. Claudia Sheinbaum, Mexico City’s head of government until a few weeks ago, was the second largest with almost 869,000 pesos. Adán Augusto López, the former interior minister, reported more than 577,000 pesos. Former Foreign Minister Marcelo Ebrard presented himself as “the most frugal” with around 385,000 pesos.
Those who spent more have been branded “squanderers” and those who say they have spent less have been branded “cynical” and “ignorant.” Monreal called the initial cut a “mockery” but stressed that he would not lodge a formal complaint so as not to jeopardize unity among claimants. Ebrard, on the other hand, was more succinct, saying this week that he had already appealed to the Morena leadership, but without making public what it was or who it was aimed at. When Adán Augusto López was the first to submit an expense report during the first week of the tour, the former foreign minister was incredulous. “Do you believe him?” he asked.
López was at the center of the controversy for announcing that he would not accept the five million the party had allocated for internal competition, assuring that the funds would come from his own pocket and assuring that he she would continue to donate to marginalized communities. Mario Delgado called the former interior minister to task because the idea of setting this amount, which acts as a campaign cap, serves two purposes: to clarify the origin of the money and to avoid control problems with the electoral authorities. The leader said he had to control his resources right in front of the National Electoral Institute (INE). In that first report, submitted motu proprio, the former governor reported that he spent an average of 600 pesos a day on meals for himself and his entire work team. “We eat little,” he explained.
The summary that Morena has presented is so concise that it does not allow for such questions. Morena’s own bottle caps have omitted her personal advertising spend, an item ‘vetoed’ in the agreement signed by the contestants in Morena’s National Council on June 11 that set out the competition’s rules. But the image of the participants and their slogans are omnipresent. “Es Claudia”, “Mejor Marcelo” and “Ahora es Adán” are written on the fences, also on the motorways, on the masts advertising their actions and on the banners of their campaign events. INE staff noted the presence of partisan advertising in their tour activities, but the referee himself was the one who decided not to penalize it.
A poster favoring Adán Augusto on public transport in Mexico City on June 11.Victoria Valtierra Ruvalcaba (Cuartoscuro)
When it’s not about campaign slogans, the hopefuls have used the old trick of promoting magazine covers and autobiographical books. Ebrard interrupted questions about his image being featured in spectacular ads with the cover of El Camino de México, saying the ads were paid for by the publisher. This information must be verified by the electoral authority within the appropriate time limits. A book about Sheinbaum’s life is also about to be published, although she has asserted that she has “dissociated herself” from the advertisements with her picture available.
For his part, Manuel Velasco, the Greens’ candidate, has appeared in a publication that describes him as a “green Corkolata”. Since they had no militancy in Morena, at least their expenses were not publicly announced. Gerardo Fernández Noroña, an MP on leave from Labor Party (PT), another Morena ally, also failed to provide an expense report. His work team states that the PT paid for his travel expenses, but the formation did not provide them with a summary of the resources to present publicly. He said his “Noroñabús,” a mobile bookstore he adapted for his tours, cost him 656,000 pesos.
When asked about the appearance of his campaign’s propaganda, López said there were some people using his image illegally, noting that he had already filed complaints about the fraudulent use of his name, a registered trademark. A report published by this newspaper details that the Corcholatas have spent a total of 8.3 million pesos over the past three months to promote their image on Facebook and Instagram, although it is not clear where these resources came from. This information was also not included in the party’s spending reports. The applicant who benefited the most from the paid social media policies was Sheinbaum, with a total count of around five million pesos of ads, according to transparency figures from Meta, Mark Zuckerberg’s company.
“We’re not doing anything illegal,” Sheinbaum responded to Ebrard’s claims of “waste”. In order not to offer any further signs of the rift, Monreal assured this week that he had spoken to other Corcholatas and they had agreed to appeal to “moderation.” “Nothing can be hidden, it is very visible,” the senator insisted on the propaganda. The media has not skimped on money-related questions. According to a comparison by the newspaper Publimetro, even if underreporting is suspected, the 2.7 million pesos of the four morena corcholatas are enough for a family to buy their groceries every month for ten years, covering the basic basket of products, according to data from the National Association of Small Merchants.
“There is no weight that has no support, no verification. “The information is consistent only with what the applicants have demonstrated to us,” reads Morena’s expense report press release, which relies on the submission of supporting documents they sent: everything from airline tickets to bills for printing screens and renting chairs. The obligation is to submit a resource report every two weeks. The fight for money is likely to remain a key issue in the race for succession, especially as the Va por México coalition has already thrown its corcholatas in the ring and now needs to clarify what it spends on and where it came from. Funds have been removed.
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