Mexico City – The flyers advertising Claudia Sheinbaum’s presidential campaign kickoff rally indicated a start time of 4 pm. However, by 2 pm, the Zocalo main square was already packed with thousands of enthusiastic supporters, spilling out into the surrounding streets.
The closer the crowd got to the Zocalo, the denser it became, making movement difficult. As the crowd slowed to a standstill, a sense of unease began to spread, until a voice broke through the chaos, urging everyone to remain calm.
“We’re all Morenistas here! Let’s take care of each other!” the voice called out, referencing supporters of Morena, a leftist political party founded by Mexico’s outgoing president, Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador.
With the reassurance from the voice, the crowd settled down, and they were able to make their way to the Zocalo to support Sheinbaum, Mexico City’s governor and protege of Lopez Obrador. An estimated 350,000 people, equivalent to the entire population of Cleveland, Ohio, attended the rally on March 1.
Morena, a political movement founded just a decade ago, has been credited with uniting Mexico, modernizing the state, and changing the relationship between the government and its citizens. Lopez Obrador, also known as AMLO, has garnered a strong following since his landslide victory in 2018, with a promise to prioritize the needs of the poor.
Under Morena and AMLO’s leadership, Mexico has implemented Keynesian reforms aimed at boosting consumer purchasing power, similar to Franklin Delano Roosevelt’s New Deal in the United States.