The Mexican Electoral Process: The Perpetuation of Fraud by Restriction of Citizen Access to Electoral Information, 14 J. Marshall J. Computer & Info. L. 151 (1995)

Authors

Lawrence E. Root Jr.

Abstract

PRI (Partido Revoluciaonario Institucional) has controlled the Mexican government for over sixty-five years. With a history of facilitating electoral fraud and voter bullying, how could Mexican citizens again vote to keep the PRI in power? Perhaps promises of a clean election and a new, more sophisticated electoral computer were nothing more than promises to defraud Mexican voters in state-of-the-art fashion. In his campaign for the presidency, PRI candidate Salinas mentioned that he hoped the new computer would foster an hones electoral process. Suddenly, the Federal Electoral Commission announced that the multi-million dollar electoral computer system crashed. When the computer system was restored, PRI candidate Salinas was ahead by just over 50 percent of the votes and was declared the victor. To discover how the PRI has been able to taint the results of the Mexican electoral process and how it continues to be able to do so, the Mexican constitution, the electoral laws, and the new electoral computer system must be analyzed. The role of Mexico’s new electoral computer system was evaluated in the context of the 1994 presidential election. The costly electoral computer system already in place must be improved and expanded if the Mexican government wants to minimize complaints of fraud and make good on promises of honest elections. The choice made by the citizen in these private booths should be electronically transferred to a central electoral computer to minimize ballot box stuffing.

Recommended Citation

Lawrence E. Root, Jr., The Mexican Electoral Process: The Perpetuation of Fraud by Restriction of Citizen Access to Electoral Information, 14 J. Marshall J. Computer & Info. L. 151 (1995)