The second presidential debate of the three candidates for the June 2 elections took place this Sunday with the participation of Claudia Sheinbaum, from the Let’s Keep Making History coalition; Xóchitl Gálvez, from the opposition coalition Fuerza y Corazón por México; and Jorge Álvarez Máynez, from Movimiento Ciudadano.
The debate, which took place in Churubusco Studios of the Mexican capital, was organized around six major themes: economic growth; employment and inflation; infrastructure and development; poverty and inequality; and climate change and sustainable development.
As occurred in the first debate, the attacks were constant, mainly and with more insistence on the part of Xóchitl Gálvez towards Claudia Sheinbaumwho chose to avoid most of the accusations and qualifiers that his opponent threw at him.
What do the candidates propose about taxes?
Xóchitl Gálvez promised to exempt Income Tax (ISR) to all workers who earn less than 15 thousand pesos per month.
“I want to give good news to Mexicans, to all those who work, to all those who get up early, who make an effort, in my government anyone who earns less than 15 thousand pesos is not going to pay taxes. We are going to forgive their taxes and this benefits 20 million Mexicans so that the money is enough for you,” he said.
While, Claudia Sheinbaum He highlighted that on December 1, 2018, the economic model in our country changed, leaving behind the old model of neoliberalism, which the ‘PRIAN’ candidate represents, a model that meant privatizations.
“The neoliberal model left starving pensions, low salaries and increased taxes. On the other hand, the transformation model, which began with this government, is a humanist model, an honest model, protector of our heritage, with better salaries, with better pensions. Without increasing taxes, there were welfare programs and strategic works for national development, neoliberalism failed,” he stressed.
On the issue of tax exemption for workers, the Citizen Movement candidate, Jorge Álvarez Máynez, He expressed: “Please, it seems very clever to me that these types of proposals have not been made when they were in public office.”
Xóchitl Gálvez ‘armed himself’ with accusations
Since the beginning of the second presidential debate, the PAN-PRI-PRD candidate, Xóchitl Gálvezbegan with the attacks on Claudia Sheinbaum and Morena.
“The criminals already have a party. Morena has become a narcoparty”Gálvez stated at the start of the second presidential debate.
“There are no more hugs for criminals,” added the opponent, referring to the motto of “hugs and not bullets” used by the president, Andrés Manuel López Obrador, to define its security policy that seeks to target the causes of violence.
Regarding Claudia Sheinbaum, the opposition standard-bearer constantly questioned the same things she pointed out in the first debate, her properties, alleged companies in her name, the fall of Metro Line 12, the Rébsamen School, and insisted on whether she would judge the children of AMLO and all those whom the PAN has accused of alleged irregularities. She even brought up the subject of Sheinbaum’s ex-husband, Carlos Imaz.
In the face of attacks, Sheinbaum simply denied the accusations and he insisted to Gálvez that if he has evidence against any government figure, he should present the corresponding complaints.
Meanwhile, Máynez tried to keep the attacks at bay; However, he took advantage of some occasions to criticize Xóchitl for the parties he represents and some government actions that Sheinbaum had as head of Government of CDMX.
In this second presidential debate, citizens from various parts of the republic sent questions to the candidates through videos, but most of them were left half-answered as they focused more on attacking each other and repelling the accusations.
At the end of the debate, Claudia Sheinbaum ‘cheered herself’ by declaring herself the winner of the night.
Memes ‘won’ the debate
Given how complicated the development of the debate was, the other side of the coin was experienced on social networks. Even before the discussion began at Churubusco Studios, hundreds of users were already ‘taking flight’ with the publication of memes.
To this he paid Jorge Álvarez Máynez, who in his presentation took out a sheet with one of those memes printed, since from the first debate he was the protagonist of the funny part on networks for his ‘eternal smile’ and his peculiar attempts to communicate in sign language.
This was the second of the three presidential debates, the next one will be on Sunday, May 19, a couple of weeks before election day.
With information from Felipe Gazcón and EFE
