Mexico is set to get its first female president, with preliminary results showing Claudia Sheinbaum, a climate scientist and Mexico City’s former mayor, is on track to win the country’s largest election in history.
Sheinbaum has won between 58.3% and 60.7% of the vote, according to what is known as Quick Count, an exercise that the National Electoral Institute (INE) carries out based on a statistical sample of ballots from polling stations.
The 61-year-old rode the wave of popularity of her longtime political ally, the outgoing leftist Mexican President Andrés Manuel López Obrador, and their Morena party.
Sheinbaum is not only set to be Mexico’s first female president, but also the country’s first leader of Jewish heritage, although she rarely speaks publicly about her personal background and has governed as a secular leftist.
Sheinbaum said her administration would govern all Mexicans “without distinction.”
“Even though many Mexicans do not fully agree with our project, we will have to walk in peace and harmony to continue building a fair and more prosperous Mexico,” she told crowds of supporters that filled the main square in Mexico City, the Zócalo, in the early hours of Monday.
She spoke about the historical significance of becoming the first female president of the country.
“I am also grateful because, for the first time in 200 years of the republic, I will become the first woman president of Mexico,” she said.
Trailing Sheinbaum is opposition candidate Xóchitl Gálvez, backed by a coalition of the National Action (PAN), Institutional Revolutionary (PRI) and Democratic Revolution (PRD) parties, with between 26.6% and 28.6% of the votes.
In third place is the Citizens’ Movement candidate, Jorge Álvarez Máynez, with between 9.9% and 10.8% of the votes.
According to the quick count results, participation in the presidential election was between 58.9% and 61.7% of the electorate of nearly 100 million people.
Obrador, the outgoing president and Sheinbaum’s political mentor, congratulated Sheinbaum on her win.
“With all my affection and respect I congratulate Claudia Sheinbaum who came out victorious with an ample margin. She will be the first (female) President of Mexico… but also the President, possibly, with most votes obtained in all of the history of our country,” he said in a video posted on X.
Sheinbaum’s projected win is a remarkable moment for a country that is a world leader when it comes to gender equality in elected office, a position it cemented in 2019 with constitutional reform. It outflanks several countries in terms of women’s parliamentary representation.
Yet Mexico remains a dangerous place to be a woman: it has sky-high femicide rates with around 10 women murdered in Mexico every day.