Morena (political party)
The National Regeneration Movement (Spanish: Movimiento Regeneración Nacional), commonly referred to by its syllabic abbreviation Morena (Spanish pronunciation: [moˈɾena]), is a major left-wing populist political party in Mexico. As of 2023, it is the largest political party in Mexico by number of members; it has been the ruling party since 2018, and won a second term in the 2024 general election.[22]
National Regeneration Movement Movimiento Regeneración Nacional
MORENA
2 October 2011[1]
10 July 2014[2]
Santa Anita #50, Col. Viaducto Piedad C.P. 08200 Iztacalco, Mexico City
2,322,136
Sigamos Haciendo Historia (2023–present)
Juntos Hacemos Historia (2020–2023)
Juntos Haremos Historia (2017–2020)
La esperanza de México[21]
('The hope of Mexico')
The party's name alludes to Mexico's Catholic national patroness: the Virgin of Guadalupe, known as 'La Morena'.[23][24][25]
Established as a non-profit organization in 2011 and registered as a political party in 2014, it was led by three-time presidential candidate and current President of Mexico, Andrés Manuel López Obrador,[26][27][28] until 12 December 2017, when he registered as a candidate for the party's nomination, and was succeeded by Yeidckol Polevnsky.[29][30]
For the 2018 general elections, it formed the coalition Juntos Haremos Historia (Together We Will Make History) with the left-wing Labor Party and the Christian conservative Social Encounter Party. It won the presidency with 53% of the popular vote and won a majority in both the Senate and Chamber of Deputies. MORENA was part of the Juntos Hacemos Historia alliance for the 2021 legislative elections. In the 2024 election, Morena's candidate for president, Claudia Sheinbaum, was elected in a landslide victory and became Mexico's first female president-elect.[31] She is due to succeed Andrés Manuel López Obrador on October 1.
History[edit]
Civil association[edit]
It was founded as a civil association on October 2, 2011.[32] The party's initial objective was to channel the political movement toward the Mexican elections in July 2012.
After the 2012 elections, the movement resolved on 20 November 2012 to transition from a social movement into a political party.[33]
After holding the first Morena National Congress on 20 November 2012, the delegates from the 32 states of the country named 300 councillors that would form the Morena National Council. The statutes and plan of action for the party organisms were accepted. The councillors chose Andrés Manuel López Obrador as president of the National Council and Martí Batres Guadarrama as president of the National Executive Committee.[34][35]
Early years (2011–2016)[edit]
MORENA was officially founded by Andrés Manuel López Obrador as a non-profit, structured as a democratic socio-political movement to protest against political corruption, electoral fraud, and the policies of what he labeled the "power mafia". Drawing support from the Yo Soy 132 student movement[36][37][38][39] it became a cross-party organization supporting his candidacy for the Presidency in the 2012 general election on 2 October 2011.[40] Following López Obrador's loss in the 2012 election, he left his former party, the Party of the Democratic Revolution (PRD), and MORENA transformed from a movement into a political party, with López Obrador as its leader.[41] A couple of days after his departure from the PRD, federal deputy Ricardo Monreal stated it was a "divorce of convenience," and that López Obrador did the most responsible thing to avoid the polarization of the country.[42] According to a 2012 poll, the majority of the Mexican public had a negative view on the establishment of MORENA as a political party.[43] On 7 January 2014, Martí Batres, president of MORENA, presented documents to the National Electoral Institute (INE) for its registration as a political party.[44]
In 2014, López Obrador revealed why he left the PRD, stating, "I left the PRD because the leaders of that party betrayed the people; they went with Peña Nieto and approved the Pact for Mexico, which is nothing more than a 'Pact against Mexico.' I can not be in a party where tax increases were approved and it was approved that they will increase the price of gasoline every month. Gasoline in Mexico costs more than in the United States, the salary in Mexico is the lowest in the entire North American continent, and instead of asking for wage increases, the PRD rose to the podium to ask for the increase in the price of gasoline, it's an embarrassment."[45] After Cuauhtémoc Cárdenas criticized him for forming his own political party, on 7 July 2014, López Obrador posted on social media that, "PRD leaders and most of its legislators voted for the fiscal reforms (raising taxes and gas prices) and with their collaboration, they paved the way for privatization of the oil industry."[46] On 10 July 2014, the INE approved MORENA as an official political party to receive federal funds and to participate in the 2015 legislative elections.[47]
2015 Mexican legislative elections
The 2015 legislative elections were the first in which MORENA participated as an official political party. It won 35 seats in the Chamber of Deputies: 14 district seats plus 21 proportional seats.