Mexico’s first female president

Mexico's first female president faces tough challenges [View in browser]( [Bloomberg]( Welcome to Balance of Power, bringing you the latest in global politics. If you haven’t yet, sign up [here](. Mexicans made history yesterday by electing [their first female president](. That Claudia Sheinbaum owes her success to the power of Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador doesn’t make victory any less sweet. The former mayor of Mexico City is a longtime protege of the man everyone knows simply as AMLO, who if the constitution had allowed, would have handily been re-elected. Instead he’s banking on preserving his legacy via the woman he anointed as successor. His Morena party is the country’s dominant political force, and it has already clinched a supermajority in the lower house with allies. If the ruling coalition also obtains two-thirds of senate seats, it will have the votes to change the constitution. WATCH: Bloomberg’s Carolina Millan reports on Sheinbaum’s landslide victory. Source: Bloomberg This much power in the hands of one group has its troubling aspects. It evokes memories of the unchecked one-party rule of the Institutional Revolutionary Party for more than seven decades, with its attendant corruption. It’s a testament to AMLO’s charisma and his keen political instincts that in the space of just six years he has consolidated control of state institutions and refashioned politics in his image. What investors will look for is whether Sheinbaum will forge her own path or if [AMLO will continue]( to pull the strings. She has embraced his policies, from cash handouts to militarized security, but her style couldn’t be more different. Where AMLO is the veteran maverick, she’s a former scientist playing it safe. The outgoing president says he’s going to retire to his ranch in the south he inherited from his parents, but will he stay there? AMLO’s glory days of a strong peso and a robust economy are fading fast. He leaves behind a country [where cartels have run amok](. A spending spree toward the end of his mandate has left Sheinbaum with a large bill to pay. That doesn’t translate into an easy beginning for Mexico’s next leader. — [Maya Averbuch]( Sheinbaum supporters at a rally at Zocalo Plaza in Mexico City. Photographer: Luis Antonio Rojas/Bloomberg Global Must Reads The impasse between Israel and Hamas over exchanging hostages for prisoners remains unchanged even after US President Joe Biden laid out what he called [an Israeli proposal to end its war]( on the Palestinian militant group. It’s clear that key aspects of the deal have not, in fact, been embraced by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. Narendra Modi’s party is set to win a decisive majority for the third straight time in India’s grueling six-week-long election, exit polls show, [extending the prime minister’s decade]( in power atop the world’s fastest-growing major economy. Opposition leaders [dismissed the surveys]( predicting a landslide victory for Modi, with a top politician calling them “a fantasy.” India’s stocks [surged to a record]( regardless, while the rupee and sovereign bonds climbed. Modi greets supporters during his roadshow in Varanasi on May 13. Photographer: Ritesh Shukla/Getty Images South Korea said it will suspend an agreement with North Korea aimed at reducing military tensions after Pyongyang sent [nearly 1,000 trash-filled balloons]( across the border in what it called a campaign against the “human scum” in the south. The halt to the 2018 deal will allow South Korean troops to resume drills near the military demarcation line. The African National Congress has begun talks with rivals to form a South African government after its worst electoral performance since Nelson Mandela led it to power in 1994. The party is [expected to meet]( with a team from the main opposition Democratic Alliance and has rejected demands by former President Jacob Zuma’s uMkhonto weSizwe that its support is contingent on President Cyril Ramaphosa leaving office. An energy crisis hitting voter wallets is putting at risk public support for the European Union’s Green Deal aimed at eliminating carbon emissions by 2050, [the world’s most ambitious climate plan](. A wave of incentives for clean technologies unleashed by the US and China is further weighing on the EU’s sticks-over-carrots approach, with the extent of the disillusionment due to become clear in European Parliament elections from June 6 to 9. Ukraine’s manpower shortage is beginning to bite. The same drain on personnel that’s weakened its forces [staving off Russia’s onslaught]( on the battlefield is also sapping the economic productivity of the war-battered nation. Global defense leaders descending on Singapore this past weekend confronted [conflicting visions of the region](: the US touted expanding military exercises and partnerships across the Indo-Pacific, while China criticized “outside forces” for interfering with peace and stability. Keir Starmer will pitch Labour as the “party of national security” in a bid to [squeeze Rishi Sunak’s ruling Conservatives]( on their traditional turf as the UK prime ministerial rivals prepare to face off tomorrow in an election debate. Washington Dispatch Hunter Biden goes [on trial in Delaware today]( in the second of two legal dramas to unfold so far during the presidential election campaign. Biden faces charges that he lied about his substance abuse on a federal firearms purchase form. He has also been indicted separately in a tax case. That trial is scheduled to begin in California this September. His legal problems present a personal as well as political burden for his father, President Biden, who’s about to leave for Europe to mark the 80th anniversary of the D-Day landing in Normandy and take part in a Group of Seven summit. Investigations by congressional Republicans to connect Hunter Biden’s business activities to the president have yielded no evidence of wrongdoing by Joe Biden. But conservatives, furious over last week’s criminal felony conviction of Republican presidential frontrunner Donald Trump in a Manhattan court, will likely trumpet every piece of evidence against Hunter Biden as they try to persuade voters of guilt by association. One thing to watch today: The House Rules Committee will discuss possible sanctions against the International Criminal Court regarding its decision to seek charges against Israeli leaders over the war in Gaza. [Sign up for the Washington Edition newsletter]( for more from the US capital and watch Balance of Power at 1 and 5 p.m. ET weekdays on Bloomberg Television. Chart of the Day Source: Flexport Ocean Timeliness Indicator Never has it been so cheap to inflict a world of economic pain. Nearly six months into the Houthis’ relentless campaign to protest Israel’s war in Gaza, the [economic fallout is widening](. As ships sail around Africa’s Cape of Good Hope, their unpredictable schedules are clogging major Asian ports, creating shortages of empty containers in some places and pileups in others. And Finally After an outbreak of violence last month [shattered the image]( of New Caledonia as an idyllic, palm-fringed slice of France in the Pacific Ocean, Emmanuel Macron made the 17,000-kilometers (11,000 mile) trip to the resource-rich archipelago, hoping to restore confidence at a time when China and other powers are eager to press their advantage in the region. Instead, the turbulence — rooted in long-standing economic strain and triggered by contentious new rules to extend the voting population — has developed into a lasting problem for the French president. A roadblock controlling access to a district in the capital, Nouméa, on May 24. Photographer: Theo Rouby/AFP/Getty Images Thanks to the 65 people who answered the Friday quiz and congratulations to Jonathan Laredo, who was the first to name North Korea as the country that sent more than 100 balloons over the border to dump “filth” on its neighbor. 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