TSE Rejects ARENA’s Last Appeals, Announces Closure of Electoral Process

TSE Magistrates announced their decision Monday night

by CISPES

On the evening of Monday, March 24, El Salvador’s Supreme Electoral Tribunal (TSE) officially closed the books on the 2014 presidential elections, announcing its dismissal of the last of ARENA’s appeals and declaring the results firm and final.

The Tribunal had formally proclaimed Salvador Sánchez Cerén of the leftist FMLN party president-elect on March 16, but the Electoral Code allows for an appeals period following the closure of the final count. The ARENA party proceeded to file over 30 claims with the TSE, including one measure to nullify the election results entirely. On March 20^th, the TSE announced that it had accepted for review two of the dozens of claims, but both were ultimately rejected.

Having exhausted all electoral procedure, ARENA has vowed to continue its campaign against El Salvador’s democratic institutions by way of the nation’s Supreme Court. FMLN legislator and party spokesman Roberto Lorenzana has said that any Court ruling against the elections outcome would constitute “a technical coup,” and that ARENA cannot “win by way of a [judicial] ruling what they lost at the ballot box.”