Thread: The 2006 Mexican presidential campaign kicks off in L.A.!!!

http://news.yahoo.com

By Sam Enriquez Times Staff Writer Mon Aug 22, 7:55 AM ET

MEXICO CITY â€â€

Why don’t they go to Mexico and vote? I wonder if George Bush is on the Ballot.

I don't know if this is a bright idea but should american citizins protest against this and say "This is the USA!" or something like that?

I also fear that the future presidents would permore illigal immigrations.

Hilarious, if it wasn't so sad. Maybe GWB will do TV commercials supporting his newest good friend!!

Illegal aliens holding public office in Mexico! This is the most infuriating story I have read in some time!

For starters, he said: How about federal legislation allowing migrants living in the United States to hold office throughout Mexico? Right now, it is allowed only in the state of Zacatecas, where Gonzalez travels once a month to serve as a councilman in his hometown, Fresnillo.

Just curious, is it possible to have a US elected official also hold office in Mexico? Could Bill Richardson, Gov. of New Mexico run for President of Mexico? That seems outrageous but the way things are headed I really don't know anymore.

We are loosing our country. This IS an invasion and we will loose our nations independence if this continues.

I am now curious if this now since in the States, would this fall under Federal Election Laws. OH yeah I guess this would be considered another law broken.

It doesn't appear the campaign event worked out very well.

http://www.dailybreeze.com/news/regs...s/1699036.html

Sunday, August 28, 2005
Mexico-style campaign hits hurdle in Los Angeles area

By S. Lynne Walker
Copley News Service

Manuel Espino looked at a sea of empty chairs in the South Gate High School auditorium Saturday and contemplated the magnitude of the challenge facing Mexico's political parties.

Espino, the leader of President Vicente Fox's National Action Party, was here to court Mexicans who in June won the historic right to vote by absentee ballot in the 2006 presidential election.



But nothing was going as planned.

A powerful politician whose appearances in Mexico command big crowds and thundering applause, Espino expected supporters to fly in from all over the United States to talk about the immigration plank in his party's campaign platform.

Instead, less than 40 seats in the high school auditorium were filled.

The empty seats provided a harsh lesson about how hard he and other politicians will have to work to win the votes of an estimated 4 million registered voters eligible to cast ballots in next year's election.

As his eyes swept the meager crowd, Espino said, "This is a good experience for us. It tells us the size of the job we have to do to stir interest among Mexicans in the United States in participating in decisions in our country."

The embarrassingly low turnout underscored the huge task Mexico's parties face in the final 10 months before the presidential election.

One in 10 Mexicans now lives in outside their country. Roughly 98 percent of those expatriates -- an estimated 11 million -- live in the United States.

In a close election, which the 2006 presidential election is expected to be, the U.S. voters could be the deciding factor.

Nobody knows yet how to reach them.

Many of these potential voters left their country years, or even decades, ago. They have assimilated into small towns and big cities across the United States. Their children were born here. They own homes and businesses. At least 100 Mexican immigrants are U.S. millionaires.

Now that they are established in the United States and schooled in this country's democracy, they have become more demanding, more critical of the Mexican government.

"We want Mexico to progress, to develop economically so that when we go to the U.S. it is for pleasure, not out of necessity," said Luis de la Garza, who left Mexico 22 years ago and is now the owner of a Spanish-language television station and a Spanish-language radio station in Dallas. "If we develop Mexico, we can slow immigration."

The expatriates have the luxury of looking to their roots and searching for a way to make Mexico a better place for those they left behind. And they hold powerful sway over family members in pueblos dotting Mexico who seek their opinions before casting ballots.

"The politicians understand that the vote of each immigrant is a double vote," said Carlos Olamendi, who left Mexico 25 years ago and now runs a restaurant in Orange County. "Immigrants have value because they have influence."

They are pushing the Mexican government to turn its attention to the impoverished countryside. And they are urging changes in financial regulations that would make it easier for them to invest in their own country. They insist that they have the right to the same financial concessions granted by the Mexican government to foreign companies that invest in Mexico.

Immigrants send home billions of dollars a year. In 2005, the figure will reach nearly $19 billion. But their ambitions now stretch beyond helping their families and contributing to public works projects.

"Immigrants are not waiting for what the parties promise," said Primitivo Rodriguez, Mexico coordinator of the Coalition for the Political Rights of Mexicans abroad, who lived in the United States for nearly 20 years before returning to Mexico. "They are saying this is what we demand. This is what we need. Now there is real pressure."

Each of Mexico's three largest parties is searching for a way to tap into the immigrant community's growing wealth and political clout.

The Institutional Revolutionary Party, or PRI, sent the 24-year-old son of presidential hopeful Roberto Madrazo to the San Joaquin Valley earlier this month to talk with immigrants about the new law allowing them to vote by absentee ballot.

Meanwhile, the leftist Democratic Revolution Party, or PRD, has begun work on its own immigration platform, which will touch on issues like scholarships or the children of immigrants, programs for women and children immigrants who face crises in the U.S. and a bi-national health care program.

To win immigrants' vote, "our strategy is very simple," said PRD congressman Juan Jose Garcia. "We have to convince people to get their voter credential so they will be on the voter registration list in time to vote."

In December, when nearly 1 million immigrants return home for the holidays, the PRD plans to launch a voter registration drive in pueblos throughout the countryside, he said. The PRD also plans to extend its political structure in the U.S. beyond traditional states like California and Illinois to new migrant-receiving states such as North Carolina, Florida and Georgia.

"This is a great opportunity to create a political community in the United States," said Garcia. "All of the parties are now obligated to include in our platforms attention to issues that will win the immigrant vote."

But no one took as great a political risk as Espino did when he became the first party president after the June congressional vote to take the campaign to the United States.

He acknowledged his party is foundering in this uncharted territory, where none of the old patterns of Mexican politics apply.

"They're going for something new here, but they're working with Mexican rules," said Steve Weingarten, a communications consultant who attended Saturday's meeting of the National Action Party, or PAN. "This just doesn't play in America. They're Mexican, but they're used to the American trappings of how politics works."





http://www.latimes.com/news/politics...lines-politics

Mexico's Ruling Party Woos Voters in the U.S.
North of the border, a rally urges support for the PAN candidate in 2006. For the first time, those living abroad will be allowed to vote.
By Daniel Hernandez
Times Staff Writer

August 28, 2005

The 2006 Mexican presidential race's first major north-of-the-border manifestation got off to a slow start on Saturday, as about 30 people attended a political platform forum in South Gate for the ruling National Action Party.

The party, known by its Spanish initials, PAN, held the forum to gauge voter concerns leading up to the first presidential election in which Mexicans living abroad, including millions in the United States, will be allowed to vote by mail.

Rallying support for PAN and the government of President Vicente Fox were Manuel Espino, the party's national president; Juan Carlos Romero Hicks, governor of Guanajuato state; and Cecilia Romero, a senator from Mexico City.

The audience in South Gate High School's auditorium consisted mostly of lower-level party operatives in the U.S., wearing shirts and ties of baby blue, PAN's signature color.

The low turnout did not diminish the event's symbolic significance for the political leaders and the few immigrant voters who attended.

Paulino Hermosillo, a South Los Angeles food service worker, said he is looking forward to voting for president of his homeland for the first time in more than 20 years.

Hermosillo, a naturalized U.S. citizen and lifelong PAN member, attended the forum with his wife and young daughter. He said he is proud and excited to be able to vote in two countries.

"Most of us came here because of the corrupt politics of PRI," said Hermosillo, 45, referring to the rival Institutional Revolutionary Party. "For us, this is a historic moment. I care about what happens in both places. I have made a family here."

But in Mexico, he added, "we've wanted a government to really care about us immigrants."

The PAN forum was the only such event the party scheduled in the United States on Saturday. Five other forums were scheduled in Mexican cities.

"This is the start of a coming together that will be more real, more palpable with the Mexicans living in the United States, because in PAN we believe Mexico is a country that transcends its borders, and we feel a debt to the Mexicans who have come to the United States over the years," said Romero, the senator.

As Mexico's three major parties prepare to add a new and distant constituency to the political landscape, political leaders expect to keep a close eye on voter interest in the race in Southern California, home to one of the largest populations of Mexicans in the world.

Experts estimate that between 3 million and 5 million Mexicans in the U.S. may vote in Mexico's election next year.

Presidential hopefuls are barred from campaigning outside Mexico once they are declared their parties' official candidates. But potential candidates are expected to make visits in the coming months to Los Angeles and other heavily Mexican cities in the U.S.

The center-right PAN hopes to retain control of Los Pinos, Mexico's White House, after breaking more than 70 years of one-party rule under PRI in 2000.

PAN's leading presidential contender, Santiago Creel, is trailing in polls behind likely candidates for the centrist PRI and the center-left Democratic Revolution Party, or PRD.

For weeks this spring, news of Fox's legal maneuvers to prevent popular Mexico City Mayor Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador from running for president dominated Spanish-language press reports in Southern California.

PAN was heavily criticized for attempting what some called an anti-democratic move to punish Lopez Obrador for defying a court order in 2001, which would have disqualified him from running for president.

The charges against Lopez Obrador, a PRD member, were eventually dropped, and he recently stepped down as mayor to campaign full time for president.

There was no talk of the controversy at the PAN forum Saturday. Instead, party leaders sought to remind their new constituents that the right to vote while living abroad was instituted during Fox's presidency, after years of stalled debate on the issue under PRI rule.

The PAN representatives told the audience Mexico has been making progress in economic growth, social welfare, human rights, democratic reforms and on environmental issues under their party's watch.

"It would be easy to fall into the old model of empty populism that only popularizes poverty," said Romero Hicks, governor of Guanajuato. Before, he added, "the Congress was practically running Los Pinos, and here I can say that."

www.signonsandiego.com



Mexican politicians face challenge in U.S.


Absentee voters are hard to reach
By S. Lynne Walker
COPLEY NEWS SERVICE
August 29, 2005

SOUTH GATE – Manuel Espino looked at a sea of empty chairs in the South Gate High School auditorium and contemplated the magnitude of the challenge facing Mexico's political parties.

Espino, the leader of President Vicente Fox's National Action Party, or PAN, came to this city bordering Los Angeles on Saturday to court Mexicans who recently won the right to cast absentee ballots in next year's presidential election.
But nothing was going as planned.

A powerful politician whose appearances in Mexico command big crowds and thundering applause, Espino expected supporters to fly in from all over the United States to talk about the immigration plank in his party's campaign platform.

Instead, only 30 seats in the auditorium were filled.

The empty seats provided a harsh lesson about how hard Mexican politicians will have to work to win the votes of the estimated 4 million registered voters in the United States eligible to cast ballots in the July 2006 election.

As his eyes swept across the meager crowd, Espino tried to find something positive in the embarrassingly low turnout.

"This is a good experience for us," he said. "It tells us the size of the job we have to do to stir interest among Mexicans in the United States in participating in decisions in our country."

One in 10 Mexicans live outside their country. Roughly 98 percent of those expatriates – an estimated 11 million – live in the United States. In a close election, which the upcoming race is expected to be, they could be the deciding factor.

But the politicians don't know how to reach them.

Many of the potential voters left their country years ago. They have assimilated into small towns and big cities across the United States. Their children were born here. They own homes and businesses. At least 100 are U.S. millionaires.

The more-established expatriates have the luxury of looking to their roots and searching for ways to make Mexico a better place for those they left behind. Now that they are schooled in U.S.-style democracy, they have become more demanding, more critical of the Mexican government.

"We want Mexico to progress, to develop economically so that when we go to the U.S. it is for pleasure, not out of necessity," said Luis de la Garza, who left Mexico 22 years ago and now owns a Spanish-language television station and a Spanish-language radio station in Dallas. "If we develop Mexico, we can slow immigration."

Immigrants send home billions of dollars a year. This year, the figure will reach nearly $19 billion. But their ambitions stretch beyond helping their families and contributing to public works projects.

They are pushing the Mexican government to turn its attention to the impoverished countryside. And they are urging changes in financial regulations that would make it easier for them to invest in their own country. They insist they should get the same financial concessions that the Mexican government grants to foreign companies that invest in Mexico.

"Immigrants are not waiting for what the parties promise," said Primitivo RodrÃÂ*guez, Mexico coordinator of the Coalition for the Political Rights of Mexicans abroad, who lived in the United States for nearly 20 years before returning to Mexico. "They are saying this is what we demand. This is what we need. Now there is real pressure."

The expatriates also command respect for another reason: They hold powerful sway over relatives in Mexico who seek their opinions before casting ballots.

"The politicians understand that the vote of each immigrant is a double vote," said Carlos Olamendi, who left Mexico 25 years ago and now runs a restaurant in Orange County. "Immigrants have value because they have influence."

Each of Mexico's three major parties is searching for ways to tap that growing wealth and political clout.

The Institutional Revolutionary Party, or PRI, sent the 24-year-old son of presidential hopeful Roberto Madrazo to the San Joaquin Valley this month to persuade immigrants to take advantage of the new law allowing them to vote by absentee ballot.

Meanwhile, the leftist Democratic Revolution Party, or PRD, is working on an immigration platform that will touch on issues such as scholarships for the children of immigrants, programs for women and child immigrants who face crises in the U.S. and a binational health care program.

In December, when nearly 1 million immigrants return home for the holidays, the PRD plans to launch a voter registration drive in pueblos throughout the countryside, PRD congressman Juan José GarcÃÂ*a said.

The party also hopes to extend its political structure in the U.S. beyond traditional states such as California, Texas and Illinois to new migrant-receiving states such as North Carolina and Georgia.

"This is a great opportunity to create a political community in the United States," GarcÃÂ*a said. "All of the parties are now obligated to include in our platforms attention to issues that will win the immigrant vote."

No one has taken as great a political risk as Espino did when he became the first party president to visit the United States after the Mexican Congress voted in June to allow absentee ballots.

The idea for the trip, Espino said in an interview before he came to California, was to ask immigrants for their ideas before the party drafts its platform.

Although that hardly sounds revolutionary in the context of U.S. politics, it is a refreshing shift for Mexicans.

"They're coming to listen," Olamendi said. "That's a change."

But when Saturday's meeting began, it had all the earmarks of a typical Mexican political gathering.

The group of dignitaries sat above the audience at a table on the auditorium stage as the session began. Then the governor of Guanajuato, Juan Carlos Romero Hicks, gave a long-winded speech that prompted some yawning spectators to stand up and leave.

"They're going for something new here, but they're working with Mexican rules," said Steve Weingarten, a communications consultant who attended the meeting. "This just doesn't play in America. They're Mexican (voters), but they're used to the American trappings of how politics works."

The session that was scheduled to last until 5 p.m. ended shortly after Espino grabbed his coat at 11:30 a.m. and headed for the door.

He acknowledged that his party is foundering in this uncharted territory, where the old patterns of Mexican politics clearly don't apply. When he gets back to Mexico City, he said his party will work on a new political strategy for the PAN's campaign north of the border.

"This is an enormous challenge. We still don't have an organization in the United States," he said. "We need a complete evaluation of our political presence in the United States."