Juárez Municipal Elections

Armando Cabada is Declared Mayor After a See-Saw Recount Process

After a contentious period of counting, recounting, and re-recounting votes, the Municipal Electoral Assembly has declared Armando Cabada did after all win his re-election bid.  He will begin serving his second term on September 9.  Initially, Cabada's opponent, Javier Gonzalez Mocken, who had served previously as mayor, was declared the victor.  Gonzalez Mocken was again confirmed the victor after a recount by the Chihuahua Electoral Institute, but Cabada appealed the decision and the Federal Electoral Institute intervened.  After a punctilious third recount, Cabada was declared the winner yesterday.

Cabada was until two years ago a popular news anchor on Canal 44, a television station owned by his family.  He ran as an independent.  His opponent, Javier Gonzalez Mocken, was appointed mayor in December 2015, when the incumbent mayor resigned to run an unsuccessful campaign for governor.  He served until October 2016, when Cabada was elected mayor.  Gonzalez was running for mayor this time under the flag of the Morena Party, which elected Anrés Manuel Lopez Obrador President this year.  In January of this year he renounced his long affiliation with the PRI party to join with Morena.

While Cabada served only a two-year term in office as mayor, he will now serve a three-year term that will end in 2021.  For many years the three-year term in office in Chihuahua's municipalities did not coincide with national elections held every three and six years.  Largely as a means of raising turnout rates, the state accommodated a change to the national cycle, and as a result Cabada's term in office was from 2016-2018.  He will be eligible for re-election in 2021.