Mexicans Are on the Verge of Electing Their First Female President

Claudia Sheinbaum’s list of accolades is long: She has a Ph.D. and a shared Nobel Peace Prize and was the first woman elected to lead Mexico City, her nation’s capital and one of the largest cities in the Western Hemisphere.

Now she has another chance to make history. Ms. Sheinbaum, 61, is the clear front-runner in the Mexican election on Sunday, putting her in position to become the country’s first female president.

“There’s this idea, because a lot of columnists say it, that I don’t have a personality,” Ms.

Sheinbaum complained to reporters earlier this year. “That President Andrés Manuel López Obrador tells me what to do, that when I get to the presidency, he’s going to be calling me on the phone every day.”

Ms. Sheinbaum says it is sexist to suggest that the possible first female leader of Mexico is really only the puppet of a man.

“There’s a trace of misogyny, of machismo there,” she told one interviewer.

“They say, ‘The only reason she’s ahead in the polls is because she’s the same as the president, or she’s the president’s favorite.’”