President Claudia Sheinbaum commenced her Thursday press conference at the later time of 9 a.m. as she spoke to United States President Donald Trump about trade earlier in the morning.
During her mañanera, she responded to public remarks made by some of Mexico’s most powerful and influential men.
Sheinbaum rules out distancing herself from the 4T
Sheinbaum said that since she took office some people, such as high-profile journalist Ciro Gómez Leyva, have wanted her to distance herself from the so-called “fourth transformation of public life in Mexico,” initiated by her predecessor Andrés Manuel López Obrador.
“How are we going to do it!” she remarked.
According to its proponents — AMLO, Sheinbaum and other Morena party representatives — the “fourth transformation,” or 4T, is based on things such as combating corruption, putting Mexico’s most disadvantaged citizens first and giving the state a larger role in the national economy.
The president told reporters that her government “will never betray our origin, our history, what we think, our principles or the people of Mexico.”
“Never. We are the continuity of the beginning of the fourth transformation,” said Sheinbaum, whose government has maintained all of the social programs introduced by the López Obrador government and championed its major infrastructure projects.
She frequently says that her government is building the “second story” of the 4T, a line that perhaps has its origin in the fact that López Obrador put her in charge of his “segundo piso” (two-story) highway project in Mexico City while he was mayor of the capital in the early 2000s.
Sheinbaum served as Mexico City environment minister during AMLO’s mayorship, which concluded in 2005 before he took his first tilt at the presidency in 2006.
The president also took aim at a claim by Gómez Leyva that López Obrador is in hiding, given that he (apparently) hasn’t been seen in public since finishing his presidency seven months ago.
“What surprise is there in something that he was saying [he was going to do] for six months before finishing his six-year term? … He said: ‘… After I finish I’m going to withdraw from public life and write a book,'” Sheinbaum said.
“Maybe it’s not one [book] but several,” she said, adding that López Obrador is simply doing what he has done his entire life — doing what he said he would do.
“… He’s in his house in Palenque, writing. … I’m not in contact with him, I just know he’s well, that he’s happy,” Sheinbaum said.
Sheinbaum accuses Mexico’s 5th-richest person of ignorance
A reporter noted that Televisión Azteca presenter Pedro Sola asserted that only taxpayers should be allowed to vote, a rule he suggested would prevent those who receive welfare “handouts” from casting ballots for the current government.
Ricardo Salinas — owner of TV Azteca and other companies, and Mexico’s fifth richest person, according to Forbes — threw his support behind the idea.
Sheinbaum described the two men as “very ignorant because all Mexicans pay taxes.”
“When you buy a product you pay the IVA,” she said, referring to Mexico’s value-added tax.
“Everyone pays. So the truth is there is a lot of ignorance,” Sheinbaum said.
“Secondly, [there is] a lot of racism and a lot of classism,” she said.
“… There is a lot of hypocrisy, but look, there should be freedom of speech, that’s the most important thing,” Sheinbaum said.
¡Mentira! (Lie!)
Sheinbaum was asked about a segment broadcast by media outlet LatinUS in which prominent journalist Carlos Loret de Mola presented footage of an armed clash in Yemen that he claimed was a confrontation between rival factions of the Sinaloa Cartel in Sinaloa.
“Put it on. That’s a very good one,” the president said to an aide.
After the segment was shown, she elicited the response she wanted from the press corps, with various reporters shouting in unison that Loret de Mola had told a “mentira” or “lie.”
The journalist, a frequent critic of the 4T, presented “a regrettable episode in Yemen … as if it were a confrontation in Sinaloa,” Sheinbaum emphasized.
“And then they complain that we have our ‘lie detector’ [segment],” she said, referring to a fake news exposé session presented at her Wednesday mañaneras.
By Mexico News Daily chief staff writer Peter Davies ([email protected])
