After the new Court, this is the judicial body whose installation sparks controversy

MEXICO CITY ( Proceso ).– The powerful Judicial Administration Body (OAJ) will be integrated after the installation of the new Supreme Court of Justice of the Nation (SCJN), this Monday, September 1.

Although the law stipulates that he must take office on the same day, it establishes a transitional period in case the new ministers fail to reach an agreement to appoint the three representatives of the Judiciary to the body responsible for managing resources, judicial careers, and the budget of the federal judiciary.

The OAJ will have five members. The three from the Judiciary will be joined by those from the Legislative and Executive branches. President Claudia Sheinbaum has already appointed Néstor Vargas Solano, with whom she has worked since his tenure as mayor of Tlalpan and later in the Mexico City government. The Senate is awaiting his appointment, which could also occur on September 1.

The other body that will begin operating on September 1 is the Judicial Disciplinary Tribunal (TDJ), whose five members were elected as members of the controversial June 1 electoral process, in which "accordions" were used to "guide" the vote.

In that process, Celia Maya García, Verónica de Gyvés Zárate, Indira García Pérez, Bernardo Bátiz Vázquez, and Rufino H. León Tovar, all close to former President Andrés Manuel López Obrador, were elected. They will take on the oversight, discipline, and sanctioning duties currently carried out by the CJF.

The reform to the Constitution regarding the Judiciary establishes in the Sixth Transitory Article that the OAJ, together with the TDJ, will begin their functions on the date the judges elected by popular vote are sworn in.

"The Judicial Disciplinary Court and the Judicial Administration Body will begin their functions on the date the Justices of the Judicial Disciplinary Court elected in the extraordinary election held in 2025 are sworn in. On that same date, the Federal Judicial Council will be dissolved," it states.

"The members of the Plenary Session of the judicial administration body referred to in Article 100 of this Decree must be appointed to begin their duties on the same day that the Magistrates of the Judicial Disciplinary Tribunal are sworn in."

Both collegiate bodies will replace the CJF. In the case of the OAJ, it will administer the human and financial resources of the entire Federal Judicial Branch (PJF), while the TDJ will assume the tasks of oversight, investigation, and sanctioning of officials of that branch, including the justices of the Supreme Court.

The final section of the Sixth Transitory Article of the judicial reform establishes that for the first appointment of the three members of the OAJ, which will take place this year, a single vote is required in the Court's plenary session.

This led the Court's Chief Justice, Norma Lucía Piña Hernández, to present a draft General Agreement during a private session on March 10th, requesting that her colleagues in the Plenary consider three proposals for the election of the three members of the OAJ.

Minister Piña's bill could not be voted on in that private session because Minister Juan Luis González Alcántara Carrancá was not present, and the Plenary decided that, given the importance of the matter, it was necessary for all members to be present.

Justice Loretta Ortiz Ahlf, one of the three who will continue in her position at the Court after obtaining sufficient votes in the judicial election, announced that she would vote against the bill, believing that these appointments should be made by the new plenary session of ministers.

In her morning press conference on March 11, President Claudia Sheinbaum accused Justice Piña and other members of the Court of attempting to "sneak a surprise" in the appointment of the members of the OAJ.

That, along with the insistence of the ministers aligned with the federal government who will continue in their positions in the new term of the Court—Ortiz Ahlf, Lenia Batres, and Yasmín Esquivel—forced the current Plenary to forgo the appointments and leave everything in the hands of the new ministers.

On August 12, the elected justices of the SCJN held their third working meeting, during which, among other things, they agreed to prioritize resolving tax and criminal matters.

They also indicated that they have begun discussions to select three of the five members of the OAJ, and will seek to decide their names "in the first sessions of September."

In a meeting with the media on August 13, Minister Loretta Ortiz indicated that this means that, if all goes well, they would have the names of the three members of the OAJ by September 2 at the latest, although she did not rule out a later date.

Legislative lifeguard

Despite the constitutional mandate, the legislative branch, dominated by Morena and its allies, incorporated a transitional article into the reforms to secondary laws that "salvage" the absence of the OAJ as of September 1.

Marcos Chávez, a labor law attorney, explains in an interview with Proceso that the reform to the Organic Law of the PJF establishes that, as long as the Judicial Administration Body is not integrated, the CJF must continue to operate.

Proceso consulted the legislation cited by the lawyer, and in accordance with the December 2024 reform, the Legislature incorporated this transitional provision to avoid a vacuum in the Judiciary without considering other circumstances.

Until the members of the Judicial Disciplinary Tribunal take the oath of office before the Senate of the Republic on September 1, 2025 - indicates the Sixth Transitory Article -, and until the Judicial Administration Body is created and its members begin functions on that same date, the Federal Judiciary Council will continue exercising the powers and attributions of administration, surveillance and discipline of the Judicial Branch, with the exception of the Supreme Court of Justice of the Nation and the Electoral Tribunal of the Judicial Branch of the Federation.

The CJF has already issued the first agreements to limit procedures during the transition period and suspend pending procedures so that the new OAJ can complete them.

However, even if the CJF continues to operate after September 1, it will not be able to fully function because it will not have board members.

Chávez points out that the CJF also works in permanent committees, with auxiliary bodies, secretariats, committees, and other administrative areas that could continue to operate.

This is because three of the current members of the Judiciary will be sworn in on September 1 as judges of the Judicial Disciplinary Tribunal: Celia Maya, Bernardo Bátiz, and Verónica de Gyvés.

Meanwhile, councilors Lilia Mónica López Benítez and José Alfonso Montalvo resigned their positions after refusing to participate in the judicial election.

Therefore, in accordance with judicial reform, their resignations are effective as of August 31.

Furthermore, on August 13, the current CJF Plenary reassigned counselor Sergio Javier Molina Martínez, who lost the judicial election in which he ran for Justice of the Court, so that starting September 1, he will join the Fourteenth Collegiate Labor Court of Mexico City, where he will replace Judge Miguel Bonilla López, who retired in early August.

“It is agreed that Judge Sergio Javier Molina Martínez will be reinstated (…) to the Fourteenth Collegiate Court for Labor Matters of the First Circuit, with residence in Mexico City (…)”, indicates the document SEADS/3034/2025, signed by Emmanuel González Estrada, Technical Secretary of the CJF’s Adscription Commission and with which Molina Martínez was notified, which was consulted by Proceso .

Therefore, only the secretariats, committees, and other areas will be able to continue operating and would have to coordinate with the Transition Commission, whose composition, as of September 1, will be as follows: the presiding judge of the Electoral Tribunal of the Federal Judicial Branch (TEPJF), Mónica Soto, and the councilors and future disciplinary judges, Gyvés and Bátiz.

This is due to Molina's reassignment to the Labor Court mentioned above and the completion of the term of the Court's presiding judge, Norma Piña, scheduled for August 31.

"Since not all members are present, they won't be able to hold a full session, but the auxiliary bodies, committees, and other areas will be able to meet," adds Marcos Chávez.

"In theory, all of this should be ready by September 1, but it seems to me that this transitional provision is establishing the possibility that something might not be integrated, and thus, it continues to leave the council with the power to continue working until it's integrated."

For this reason, on August 27, the CJF held an extraordinary session in which it ordered the suspension of procedural deadlines from September 1 to 15 in the single courts or those that, due to judicial reform, will be left without judges until the OAJ appoints the new judges elected by popular vote.

"In order to ensure the proper operation and functioning of the judicial bodies, until the Judicial Administration Body appoints the judges elected in the recent democratic exercise, from September 1 to 15, 2025," the published agreement states.

All commissions of magistrates who have tenure in 2027 positions (not drawn by lot) are extended until September 15, 2025, or earlier if the Judicial Administration Body so determines (...) All appointments of secretaries in functions of District judges or Circuit magistrates, and of persons in charge of the office of the jurisdictional bodies, are extended until September 15, 2025, or earlier if the Judicial Administration Body so determines.

Proceso reported that during this period, the acting criminal judges will not be able to rule on precautionary measures, release decrees, legal proceedings, or final sentences because the law does not allow it.

Although payroll payments are guaranteed until next December, there are no measures to ensure the end-of-year bonus and Christmas bonus payments because the PJF received a smaller budget this year and there are insufficient resources to make those payments.