61-year-old Claudia Sheinbaum is set to become Mexico's first female president.

Voting began on Jun. 2, 2024

Mexico went to the polls on Jun. 2, 2024, where nearly 100 million of the country's 129 million inhabitants were registered to vote for a new president.

They were also casting their votes for members of Congress, several state governors and local officials, and a total of more than 20,700 positions were up for grabs.

In the running for president were 61-year-old Sheinbaum from the ruling party, Morena, Xóchitl Gálvez, who is also 61 and from the main opposition alliance, and Jorge Álvarez Máynez, 38, who represents the Citizen's Movement and is the only man running.

The winner would succeed President Andrés Manuel López Obrador on Oct. 1 for a six-year term.

López Obrador, known for his initials AMLO, is popular and has relatively high approval ratings but cannot run for re-election as presidents in Mexico are only allowed to serve one term.

Sheinbaum led opinion polls by wide margin

Some of AMLO's popularity has rubbed off his mentee and fellow leftist, Sheinbaum, who has pledged to continue his controversial "hugs not bullets" strategy.

She has also pledged to continue and build on AMLO's political project — "Fourth Transformation" or "4T", which aims to be the fourth transformative period in Mexico's history, after its independence in 1810, the Reform War (and separation of church and state) of 1858 and the Mexican Revolution in 1910, BBC reported.

The hugs not bullets strategy aims to attack violent crime at its roots rather than go to war against Mexico's powerful drug cartels, the latter of which Gálvez has vowed to do if she becomes president.

Gálvez, an outspoken senator and businesswoman with indigenous roots, has declared that "hugs for criminals are over" and pledged to capture and restrain Mexico's most violent and aggressive criminal organisations.

However, chances of her doing so are slim.

As campaigning drew to a close, opinion polls swung in Sheinbaum's favour, where she secured 53 per cent of the votes and held a 17 percentage point lead over Gálvez's 36 per cent, according to a poll average compiled by research firm Oraculus, Reuters reported.

Máynez trailed behind at 11 per cent.

Sheinbaum said in victory speech that Gálvez and Máynez conceded

Official election results will only be announced on Jun. 8.

However, Morena and several Mexican media outlets have declared Sheinbaum the winner after polls closed on Jun. 2, Reuters reported.

Morena party head Mario Delgado told supporters in Mexico City that Sheinbaum had won by a "very large" margin.

The National Electoral Institute’s president said Sheinbaum had between 58.3 per cent and 60.7 per cent of the vote, according to a statistical sample, the Associated Press reported.

Gálvez had between 26.6 per cent and 28.6 per cent of the vote while Máynez had between 9.9 and 10.8 per cent of the vote.

In her victory speech on Jun. 2, Sheinbaum said Gálvez and Máynez had called her and conceded.

Who is Sheinbaum?

Sheinbaum was born in Mexico City, and was formerly its Head of Government (governor).

She is a scientist and academic, and was a contributing author of the United Nations’ Nobel Peace Prize-winning Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change.

Her first public role was as Secretary of the Environment of Mexico City in 2000, before she rose through the ranks and became its first female governor in 2018.

She resigned from her position in 2023 to run in the 2024 presidential election.

As Mexico's new president, Sheinbaum will face several challenges, including organised crime, security, immigration, which would set the tone for the pivotal US-Mexico bilateral relationship.

She will inherit a host of issues from AMLO's term, including staggering budget deficit equivalent to 5.9 percent of the country's GDP, water and energy shortages and environmental issues, Al Jazeera reported.

Top image from @visegrad24/X, formerly Twitter