President elect of Mexico, Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador speaks during the celebration event, at the end of the Mexico 2018 Presidential Election on July 1, 2018 in Mexico City, Mexico. The months leading up to the July 1st victory of Mexican president-elect AndrA s Manuel LA3pez Obrador were fraught with uncertainty: would entrenched economic and political interests ever allow him to win? The attempt to prevent him from ever becoming president succeeded twice, in 2006 and 2012, through a combination of outright electoral fraud, vote-buying, terror, murder, judicial harassment, and McCarthyite scare tactics.