PRI to challenge electoral body's order to remove 'narco-party' label for Morena

Mexico's Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI) is challenging a National Electoral Institute (INE) ruling that ordered it to remove nine posts labeling the ruling Morena party a "narco-party." The PRI's representatives argued before the INE's General Council that the electoral body overstepped its authority by attempting to silence a legislator.

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Mr. Counselor, you are respectfully interpreting the constitutional prohibition of slander with a legitimate popular representation, in this case Senator Alejandro Moreno Cárdenas. Neither you, nor I, nor even the president of the Chamber of Deputies can reprimand a deputy, or in this case, a senator. You cannot either, not even the commission in full.

"Mr. Counselor, you are respectfully interpreting the constitutional prohibition of slander with a legitimate popular representation, in this case Senator Alejandro Moreno Cárdenas," stated PRI representative Marcela Guerra. She asserted that neither the counselor, herself, nor the president of the Chamber of Deputies can reprimand a legislator, and neither can the INE. "The Institute is silencing a voice, a legislator's voice, and that is very serious," Guerra added, vowing to continue making the accusation.

The PRI insists that Mexico should not have a pre-approved list of permissible or prohibited words for political opposition. "We are the opposition and we will continue to be. And today, the narco-government is being discussed, whether you like it or not," Guerra declared.

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The Institute is silencing a voice, a legislator's voice, and that is very serious. I repeat it again and will continue to say it. I, as a legislator, no one will tell me what I have to express, if I so wish, because in Mexico there cannot be a prior catalog of permitted and prohibited words to make opposition. We are the opposition and we will continue to be. And today, the narco-government is being discussed, whether you like it or not.

Emilio Suárez Licona, representing the PRI, announced the party's firm intention to appeal the resolution. "We are going to challenge this resolution with all determination and in the Superior Chamber, so that they also hear us, we will go to International Justice, to the Inter-American Court, so that no instance in this country censors a senator of the Republic who is invested with parliamentary immunity."

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We are going to challenge this resolution with all determination and in the Superior Chamber, so that they also hear us, we will go to International Justice, to the Inter-American Court, so that no instance in this country censors a senator of the Republic who is invested with parliamentary immunity.

INE counselor Arturo Castillo defended the commission's decision, clarifying that Alejandro Moreno was not acting as a senator but as the national president of the PRI's Executive Committee when the posts were made. He noted that Moreno was represented by legal counsel in that capacity, not as a senator, indicating the INE's ruling pertains to his party role, not his legislative immunity.

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It seems important to me to point out the following: in this case, Alejandro Moreno was not acting as a senator of the Republic, he was acting as President of the National Executive Committee of the PRI, so much so that all the actions that are part of the file were attended by the master Sixto Duarte Álvarez and according to, precisely, the protocolization of the appointment of Sixto Duarte as Legal Secretary and Transparency of the National Executive Committee of the PRI.