Overview
- The Sala Superior of the TEPJF, which ruled Wednesday, October 7, unanimously held that ballots lacking visible fold marks cannot be objectively linked to a valid vote and must not be counted when that condition is proven.
- The court partially revoked the INE’s lineamientos for electoral counts and ordered the institute to rewrite procedures for the 2026–2027 federal process to reflect the new rule.
- The ruling assigns primary authority to polling-station boards (mesas directivas de casilla) to identify and segregate undeformed ballots during the original count and allows district councils to act only exceptionally during recounts.
- Magistrate Felipe de la Mata based the decision on the legal voting sequence—receive, mark, fold, deposit—and used the size mismatch between ballots and the urn slot to argue that an unfolded ballot could not enter the urn lawfully.
- The court cited past incidents in 2024 and the 2025 judicial election where hundreds of casillas reported undeformed ballots, and the decision requires such ballots to be logged, kept separate from counted votes, and treated as non‑votes to protect count certainty.