Support for AMLO and MORENA among Mexico’s indigenous people
As a Mexican living in the United States, it can be tough to voice support for Mexico’s 65th President, Andrés Manuel López Obrador (“AMLO”). Throughout his Presidency, attacks have come from all sides—from the right, from the left, from those with and without Mexican ancestry, etc. One of the most common line of attacks is the claim that AMLO and the political party that he co-founded, the Movement for National Regeneration (MORENA), are opposed by the indigenous population. But is that truly the case?
The claim has always seemed odd to me. For one thing, the speeches delivered by AMLO every week, all around the country, have a great showing of indigenous peoples in support of his presidency, including the notable event his first day in office in which indigenous groups came together to support his presidency. AMLO, a mestizo (mixed Indigenous/European descent), actually began his career as a public official working within the indigenous community in his home state of Tabasco. He made national news in 1995, when he stood with the indigenous community against pollution caused by oil drilling.
In 2008, two years after his first unsuccessful run for the presidency, a notable march and speech shows him being welcomed by residents of Cochoapa el Grande—one of the poorest communities in Mexico, with around 90% of residents being indigenous (18,849 out of 21,241 residents speak Mixteco).
It is important to go beyond social media appearances and examine cold hard evidence: What do the numbers, available to anyone with an internet connection, say about how the indigenous people of Mexico feel about AMLO and the MORENA party?
Evidence from the Mexican Election Survey (2018)
The Estudio Nacional Electoral (National Election Survey) is run by Mexico’s CIDE, a federally financed center for research in the social sciences. In 2018, it conducted a public opinion poll in the weeks following the national election. Among the questions, people were asked both to disclose for whom they had voted for President, and whether they would classify themselves as Indigenous, Mestizo, or White. According to AMLO’s detractors, Indigenous support for him is very low, but what do the numbers actually say?
The numbers show that in 2018, AMLO was the most popular choice of Indigenous Mexicans. Specifically, 49% of Indigenous Mexicans favored his presidency, with the second most popular candidate, Ricardo Anaya of the National Action Party, PAN, at a distant 22%. The story is similar with Mestizos and Whites: 45% of Mestizos voted for AMLO, as did 42% of Whites. In other words, AMLO was the most popular candidate among all three of these ethnic groups, and he was even somewhat more popular among Indigenous people than he was among Mestizos and Whites.
But don’t the Zapatistas disapprove of AMLO and MORENA?
Someone could criticize the analysis above by pointing out that it is a national analysis. “Perhaps AMLO is more unpopular among indigenous people in specific areas, such as the areas of the Zapatista uprising?”
We can actually examine this issue using the data from the same 2018 survey. If we do that, what we find is that when we look at the State of Chiapas, 73% of indigenous people voted for AMLO. That is to say, AMLO was more even more popular among indigenous people in the state that saw the Zapatista uprising than he was among indigenous people in other parts of the country.
Beyond public opinion polling, how did the actual vote go?
It might be tempting to dismiss the above by pointing out that it is “only” public opinion polling and not the actual voting patterns. For this reason we can examine the voting patterns in Chiapas in 2018. The results are available to anyone with an internet connection, and the patterns are clear: AMLO won up and down the State of Chiapas, including the southeastern portion associated with the Zapatistas (such as the Districts of Ocosingo, Palenque, San Cristobal de las Casas, Comitán de Domínguez, and Las Margaritas).
Maybe the indigenous community has reduced support for AMLO since 2018?
An argument could be made that looking at 2018 numbers doesn’t make sense—maybe after 5 years of AMLO, the indigenous community as a whole disapproves of his leadership? We can actually answer this question by examining another public opinion poll.
The Barómetro de las Americas is a long-running public opinion poll conducted by US universities. The latest available data are from May/July of 2023. Among the questions, Mexicans were asked to rate AMLO’s government on a 5-point scale, and they were also asked about their ethnicity.
The results show that all three major ethnic groups, Indigenous, Mestizos, and Whites, rate AMLO at about a 4, which stands for “good”*. In fact, Indigenous Mexicans are a little higher (average of 4.1), with Mestizos and Whites rating AMLO at an average 3.9.
We can examine the results in a box plot, which shows us the distribution of responses. We can clearly see that all three groups tend to support AMLO (each group is generally above 3, the neutral point). We can see there is a full range of feelings toward AMLO among White Mexicans: around 25% have him lower than 3. But almost all Indigenous Mexicans have AMLO above 3.
The message from these numbers looks clear: Five years after his election, AMLO still had high approval among Indigenous Mexicans, even somewhat higher than his support among Mestizos and Whites (who generally also have high approval of AMLO).
MORENA’s general support among Indigenous people
Does AMLO’s popularity transfer to the MORENA party? The Barómetro survey also includes a question which asks whether people identify with a political party. While most people said they do not identify with a political party, of those that do identity, 90% of Indigenous Mexicans identify with MORENA, a number that falls to 84.3% for Mestizos, and 77.8% for Whites. In other words, MORENA is the most popular party in Mexico not just in general, but especially so among Indigenous Mexicans.
Critiques of AMLO and MORENA: Fact vs. fiction
Of course, no leader, government, or party is “perfect.” But critiques of leaders, governments, and parties should be grounded in facts.
The numbers above suggest that AMLO and MORENA are quite popular among the indigenous population of Mexico. This runs counter to the narrative that is common in the United States, which pits AMLO against indigenous people. In reality, the great majority of the indigenous population of Mexico are strongly in support of AMLO, his government, and the MORENA political party.
*Note that the analyses of the rating scale in the 2023 survey used reverse coding, as is typically done in analyses of surveys.
