Mexican Congressional Commission Approves Controversial Reform to the Judicial Branch

The reform of the Judicial Branch of the Mexican president, Andrés Manuel López Obrador, which proposes the election of judges by popular votetook the first step yesterday Monday after being approved by the ruling party majority in the Constitutional Affairs Committee of the Chamber of Deputies.

With 22 votes in favor of the ruling National Regeneration Movement (Morena) and its allies, the Labor Party (PT) and the Green Ecologist Party (PVEM), and 17 against the opposition, the reform outlines judicial elections and a new integration of the Supreme Court of Justice of the Nation (SCJN).

The ruling, which includes 100 modifications proposed by Morena, proposes two elections to renew the positions of the Judicial Branchthe first of which will be extraordinary, in June 2025.

The initiative, proposed in a package of reforms last February by López Obrador, seeks, among other things, to reduce the number of SCJN justices from 11 to 9 and to reduce their terms of office from 15 to 12 years.

It also includes the elimination of the lifetime pension for current and future ministers of the Court, and an adjustment of their remuneration to the maximum limit established for the president of Mexico.

In addition to replacing the Federal Judicial Council with two institutions, including a Judicial Disciplinary Court, and the elimination of the two chambers that the Supreme Court currently has.

The ruling party plans to vote on the reform in the plenary session in September, when it will have the two-thirds of Congress necessary to modify the Constitution, after the elections of June 2.

The opposition warns of risks

Despite the imminent approval of the reform, representatives of the opposition, made up of the Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI), National Action Party (PAN), the Democratic Revolution Party (PRD) and the Citizen Movement (MC), They spoke out against it because of the risks to judicial independence.

PAN deputy Héctor Téllez said that the controversial reform is a “transgression” of judicial independence, a violation of the principle of separation of powers and a “co-optation” of the Judiciary.

“For all the above reasons, we at the National Action Party will vote against this ruling. and we urge you to reformulate it in a way that evaluates and considers the existing flaws in the entire justice system,” he emphasized.

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