Victor Fuentes/Reform Agency
Monday, January 02, 2023 | 06:44
Mexico City.- The Supreme Court of Justice of the Nation (SCJN) today elects its new president and, for the third time in the last 24 years, everything indicates that it will require more than one round of voting to reach a winner.
Sources from the Court estimated that none of the three competing ministers and two ministers will reach the six necessary votes in the first round, and they did not rule out that three rounds are necessary, in the session that will be chaired by the dean and former president Luis María Aguilar.
The sources estimated that, in the first round, it is likely that no one will have even four votes, unless some candidate suddenly declines his candidacy before the vote.
The applicants are the Ministers Norma Piña and Yasmín Esquivel, who, if one of them obtains the vote of her peers, would become the first woman to preside over the Court and the Federal Judicial Council (CJF).
Esquivel has been facing a scandal since last week over the alleged plagiarism of his undergraduate thesis, which could lead to the revocation of his professional title. On the subject, UNAM postponed a decision despite having evidence to issue a resolution.
No member of the Court has commented on this case, nor can they do so, since there are several scenarios in which the court itself could make decisions about the future of Esquivel.
The other applicants are Ministers Javier Laynez, Alberto Pérez Dayán and Alfredo Gutiérrez Ortiz Mena.
The Internal Regulations of the Court order as many rounds as necessary until someone gets six votes, but from the first round those who have the fewest votes are eliminated.
The Court has required a single round to choose the new president in four of the six elections between 1999 and 2019, reflecting consensus achieved by the winner over months or years of agreements with his colleagues.
The two exceptions were 1999, when Genaro Góngora required two rounds to reach eight votes, and 2015, when there were only 10 ministers due to the death of Sergio Valls.
On this last occasion, 32 rounds passed until Juan Silva Meza broke the tie between Aguilar and Arturo Zaldívar in favor of the former, putting an end to a situation of stubbornness by all the ministers that was becoming nationally ridiculous for the Court.
However, pre-voting declines occur frequently, when the challenger is clear that he cannot win, and that can make it easier for another to win in a single round.
Pérez Dayán declined at the beginning of the January 2019 session in which Zaldívar was elected, Alfredo Gutiérrez did the same in 2015, and José Ramón Cossío announced it in a letter to public opinion, which left the way clear for Silva Meza in 2011.
Gutiérrez is competing for the third time, Pérez Dayán for the second time -for both, it is the last chance- while Javier Laynez, Piña and Esquivel are participating for the first time.
Except for Esquivel, the others are seen as options that will not have the closeness to the Executive that characterized the Zaldívar presidency.
But a victory for Piña, in addition to being historic due to the gender issue, would return the command of the PJF to a career federal judge and magistrate, which would also happen if Pérez Dayán wins.
As of 1995, the six presidents prior to Zaldívar were career judges, but President Andrés Manuel López Obrador has made clear his antipathy towards this sector, by nominating four lawyers who did not come from the PJF, which now only has four. of the seven seats on the highest court.
The president of the Court controls the list of issues for discussion in plenary, so Zaldívar’s successor or successor could speed up the review of a dozen of López Obrador’s reforms and policies, to clarify their constitutionality, in the 21 months that remainder of the six-year term.
The presidency also appoints all the senior administrative officials of the Court and the CJF, the body that administers and oversees 956 courts and tribunals, with its almost 50,000 employees.
