Mexico INE electoral institute reform and 2027 budget cut, Digi Mart USA News (Mexico): Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum said the National Electoral Institute (INE) must be cleaned up and must act with transparency and austerity to guarantee free and democratic elections in Mexico. Speaking at a press conference at the National Palace, she said the campaign phrase “the INE is not to be touched” was a strategy to defend corruption and bad practices within the institute.
“The INE does have to be cleaned up. Perhaps they said ‘don’t touch the INE’ in order to protect all the electoral mafia that was built with them,” Sheinbaum said.
She added that the INE must guarantee the popular will and clean elections while operating with transparency and republican austerity.
Sheinbaum said attacks on the INE were aimed at harming Morena, the party that she said has been better informed by the public since it came to power in 2018. She said the government will defend the people as long as it does not betray them.
She also said the INE should face a budget cut in 2027 because the proposed budget it submitted was “inflated.” She expressed support for a proposal from the Chamber of Deputies to reduce the institute’s budget by 5,000 million pesos for the coming year.
Sheinbaum said the INE faces a major challenge next year because of the large resources that will be spent on the 2027 elections. She said the institute must be transparent, and she referred to upcoming tenders for the 2027 election, calling for full transparency at the Talleres Gráficos printing works.
She said the government would strengthen its board of administration for that purpose.
