Hundreds of protesters broke into Mexico’s Senate on Tuesday as lawmakers weighed a contentious plan to overhaul the country’s judiciary, forcing the body to take a temporary recess for the safety of the senators.
The shut down came just hours after Mexico’s ruling party, Morena, wrangled the votes it needed to jam through the proposal after one member of an opposition party flipped to support it.
That move and other political maneuvering ahead of a vote on the plan championed by outgoing President Andrés Manuel López Obrador fueled even more outrage after weeks of protests by judicial employees and law students.
Critics and observers say the plan, in which all judges would be elected, could threaten judicial independence and undermine the system of checks and balances.
Some protesters entered the Senate chambers in an effort to block the vote after they said lawmakers were not listening to their demands. Protesters broke through the door of the Senate chamber pushing aggressively, using pipes and chains. At least one person fainted after protesters broke in.
“The judiciary isn’t going to fall,” yelled the protesters, waving Mexican flags and signs against the overhaul. They were joined by a number of opposition senators as they chanted in the chamber. Others outside the court roared when newscasters announced the Senate was taking a recess.
Among them was Alejandro Navarrete, a 30-year-old judicial worker, who said that people like him working in the courts “knowing the danger the reform represents” came to call on the Senate to strike down the proposal.
“They have decided to sell out the nation, and sell out for political capital they were offered, we felt obligated to enter the Senate,” he said, carrying a Mexican flag. “Our intention is not violent, we didn’t intend to hurt them, but we intend to make it clear that the Mexican people won’t allow them to lead us into a dictatorship.”
Despite unrest in recent weeks, the plan sailed through the lower chamber of Congress last week, and was passed onto the Senate, where López Obrador’s Morena party lacked the necessary supermajority to approve it. In recent weeks, it was able to peel off two senators from an opposition party, but came into this week still missing one more.
It was unclear where that vote would come from because the country’s opposition vehemently opposes the plan. But over the weekend, observers began to speculate that a senator from the conservative National Action Party (PAN), Miguel Ángel Yunes Márquez, would support Morena as he refused to answer calls from his party leadership.
On Tuesday, Yunes Márquez announced he would take leave due to health issues and be replaced by his father, Miguel Ángel Yunes Linares, a former governor of Veracruz said he would vote for the plan. He said he knew the plan was “not the best” but said more laws down the line could improve it.
“Mexico is not going to be destroyed for approving this reform, nor will the reform automatically change the reality of a justice system that is calling out for fundamental change,” Yunes Linares said.
Yunes Linares strolled into the Senate chambers and was met with applause and chants of “hero!” by Morena senators and screams of “traitor!” from his own party. One PAN senator, Lilly Téllez, even threw dozens of coins at Yunes Linares, calling him a ”traitor who sold out his country” for his own benefit. A Senate vote was expected Wednesday.
The national head of PAN, Marko Cortés, claimed that it “is evident” that there was an “impunity pact” between the Yuneses and the government so he would vote in favor of the overhaul. Cortés was referring to a July arrest order for Sen. Yunes Márquez, for alleged falsification of documents and fraud related to his candidacy.
Yunes had challenged it and got a temporary suspension, calling it a political persecution by the governing Morena party, the same party his father now appears ready to support.
His father, Yunes Linares, dodged questions from the media about how he would vote but accused Cortés of “lynching” him and claimed it was “absolutely false” that he has been coerced to vote for the overhaul. He was flanked by two Morena senators as he spoke.
A Yunes vote in favor would allow the ruling party to clear the biggest hurdle in making the proposal law. If it passes the Senate, it will have to be ratified by the legislatures of 17 of Mexico’s 32 states, but the governing party is believed to have the necessary support.
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