Enrique Peña Nieto Biography

Enrique Peña Nieto was elected 1 July 2012 and took office as Mexico’s 57th president 1 December 2012. He grew up in the State of Mexico in a politically connected family, joined the Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI) at 18, studied law and business and went to work in politics. During his rise, Nieto served in several different administrative capacities for the State of Mexico, ending up as a close aid to Governor Carlos Salinas de Gortari. When Gortari left office, Nieto was elected to succeed him in 2005, and held that post until 2011. As the popular governor of the State of Mexico, he was thrust onto the national stage, and as soon as his term was over, Nieto announced his candidacy for the presidency. Nieto won with 37.6% of the vote, despite talk of his infidelities during his first marriage, his verbal gaffes along the campaign trail and his critics who derided him as a pretty face with more hairdo than intellect. He succeeded Felipe Calderón in December of 2012, vowing to take a new tack in Mexico’s drug war and pledging economic development.