Politics: Anaya faces a tough road to victory
The two weeks since the year’s first presidential candidates’ debate have not been good to Andrés Manuel López Obrador, whose poor debate performance appears to have capped his rise in the polls. Both the PRI and the Front alliance have stepped up their attacks on the candidate, whose campaign is looking increasingly reactive and leaden.
The same fortnight has been exceedingly kind to Ricardo Anaya, with most polls showing him gaining traction and consolidating as the only candidate positioned to seriously compete against López Obrador. His campaign recovered some of the momentum he enjoyed in March and early April before having to spend valuable time fending off accusations of illegal business transactions.
But nothing fundamental has changed: López Obrador retains a considerable edge of 8 to 18 points, and Anaya’s latest uptick came at the expense of the rest of the field, as polling suggests that at this point AMLO voters are among the most wed to their candidate. There has been considerable talk of trying to build a broad "stop-AMLO" coalition and having other contenders, including the PRI’s José Antonio Meade, defer to Anaya, yet despite the latter’s decision to direct all his campaign’s fire at Obrador while sparing the PRI and the current government, the obstacles to such a de-facto alliance appear insurmountable.
It might be more effective to focus on getting out a "stop-AMLO" vote than to push for any candidates to exit the race, but the effect would also be limited. It is likely that support for the PRI candidate and both independents may have fallen about as far as possible, and that most of the anti-AMLO "lesser-evil" voters in that camp have probably already lined up behind Anaya. More importantly, there is no reason to assume that tactical voting would be unidirectional. Polling suggests supporters of the three candidates lowest in the polls would be more inclined to abstain than switch loyalties, and the rest appear divided over exactly which of the leading candidates constitutes a lesser evil, with a significant minority of them likely to opt for López Obrador.
In short, Anaya’s only path to victory involves winning over many voters who currently plan to vote for AMLO.
Now read on...
Register to sample a report