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The second round of the 2016 Peruvian elections brought a massive campaigned for a null vote or "voto viciado". People were “fed up” with both pro-business candidates, Keiko Fujimori, daughter of the jailed former president, and centrist economist Pedro Pablo Kuczynski (Scollo and Traj 2016).
In the streets of Peru, the citizen protest was not long in coming. Supporters from the left called electors to cast a null vote to show not one candidate represents a viable option to change the real situation of the country (LaMula.pe 2016a). That political climate was surrounded by high levels of corruption, the failure of public investment, extreme poverty, low confidence in public institutions, particularly in the legislative and the Judiciary branch, and others (Santander 2016).
Amid this conflict, the former presidential candidate of "Frente Amplio," Verónika Mendoza, spelled out her voting for both candidates are ruled out as well her political party will be "The opposition" (LaMula.pe 2016b).
5.2. Lower Chamber elections 5.2.1. Argentina
During the electoral legislative process of 2001, the campaigns supporting the ballots spoilage reached such magnitude that the press described the phenomenon as the "voto bronca"
or protest vote (Epstein and Pion-Berlin 2006).
The Argentine people came to the elections during a severe crisis, both political and economic. According to Herrero (2013), a rumor circulated that senators had received substantial bribes in exchange for their favorable vote on the labor reform proposed by Executive during the 2001 elections. This news shook De la Rua's government and, more so when Vicepresident Carlos Alvarez resigned as a protest of the corruption scandal (Lettieri 2012).
The political crisis was aggravated in the context of acute economic depression and financial bankruptcy (Salvia 2015), as well as the high unemployment rate and inequality (Adlatina 2001). Public anger ensued and further eroded the people's belief in elections as an effective mechanism of political accountability (Peruzzotti 2006).
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The discrediting of the public institutions and the inability of some political leaders to honestly govern, triggered the calling of abstention and annulment of votes during the electoral campaign, by the citizens, through the internet and social media (Silletta 2005). The one initiated by Clarin and the Nation Newspaper Groups, through its pages, instigated the exercise of "voto bronca" (Lettieri 2012; Llorens 2015).
According to the Clarin newspaper, the null vote movement was a great success (Clarin 2001; Lettiere 2012). The protest vote ranked in the second position at the national level with approximately 24 percent (Salvia 2015), while in Federal Capital, Buenos Aires, Córdoba, and Santa Fe were the option most voted by citizens (Zicari 2014). In this way, the "voto bronca" was the protagonist of the 2001 legislative elections. Million Argentines preferred not to choose any candidate but to spoil their ballots as a criticism of the political system, particularly on the political elites, aggravated by the increase in corruption (Telechea 2010) and the economic crisis (Lettieri 2012; Salvia 2015).
Finally, this remarkable event was a hard blow against Fernando de la Rua's government, whose breakdown came two months later with his resignation from the office (Zicari 2014).
5.2.2. Colombia
The blank/null vote in Colombia implies more than simply cast a ballot in protest. In the 2014 Colombian parliamentary elections, invalid voting movements were led by Colombian celebrities and groups such as the screenwriter and journalist, Gustavo Bolívar, and the professor from Colombia national university, Daniel Libreros Caicedo as well as the Coalition of Social Movements and Organizations of Colombia and the Socialist Workers Party (Suárez 2014).
According to Semana (2014), there were many Colombians who didn't feel identified with the alternatives at stake while the lack of credibility in stable institutional structures had been accentuated, favoring this punishment vote for politicians and political parties.
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5.2.3. Ecuador
In the 2006 legislative elections amid corruption allegations among the traditional political parties in Ecuador who controlled to the National Congress, the ex-president of Ecuador, Rafael Correa encouraged people to cast a null vote as a demonstration of rejection of that partidocracia (patriarchy) while his political party called "Alianza Pais" (PAIS Alliance) refused to launch congressional candidates as a measure to abolish that institution (Machado 2007).
In Lucero Bolaños's opinion, ex-president of Ecuador's National Congress, that invalid vote campaign didn't achieve its objective of delegitimizing the National Congress, who considered that movement as undemocratic and destabilizing a democratic system (Ecuadorinmediato 2006).
5.2.4. El Salvador
The only way to protest against El Salvador's 2015 Legislative process is to cast a blank, or null vote affirmed the Central American Socialist Party (PSOCA for its acronym in Spanish) and various political and social organizations. They called people to support that campaign because, in their opinion, no candidate or party represented the interests of the workers, peasants, indigenous people, students, and others (Centro de Medios Independientes 2015).
There is a general sense of dissatisfaction with the political class in EL Salvador (Wade 2018). In fact, in the 2018 Salvadoran legislative election, Nayib Bukele, the current president and a former mayor of El Salvador's capital, promoted a campaign to encourage voters to cast an invalid ballot (El Salvador Times 2018), receiving positive support by other politicians. After the launch of this social movement, another strong campaign on social networks was released to promote the null/blank vote in the population (El Salvador Times 2018). With the result in hand, the proportion of invalid votes for the legislative contest in 2015 was exceeded by three times.
5.2.5. Mexico
A mass movement of spoiled votes appeared across election campaigns in the 2009 midterm federal elections in Mexico. Before 2009, the null-vote was few that even legislators
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considered it as insignificant and unnecessary without any influence in the tally. However, during the 2009 deputies' elections, diverse groups emerged simultaneously to promote invalid voting as a way to protest against Mexican politicians (Crespo 2010).
These movements led by intellectuals, business people, and student groups did not have structures, central organizations, or financing (Crespo 2010). The only thing that united all organizations was the same conviction that annulling the vote would show discontent for the political class (Cisneros 2012; Lara 2015) and against the parties' candidate in the elections (Langston 2018). In words of Ellingwood (2009), disenchanted voters charged politicians for failing to address corruption, organized crime, a sclerotic school system, poverty, and economic crisis.
According to Cisneros (2012), 49 groups were registered in no less than 20 Mexican states, while in social networks, 250 Facebook groups were associated with the campaign for the null votes (Alonso 2010). The presence of these groups on the electoral process created various debates in the media that made the National Electoral Institute proposed a public debate to hear the opinions of the promoters of the null vote (Alonso 2010).
As a result of this political clamor, more than 5 percent of people "annulled" their ballots, a higher percentage than those obtained by the political parties: PT, PANAL, Convergence, and PSD (Zamitiz 2010). According to Lara (2015), the null vote mobilization was so successful that, after the 2009 elections, the former President Felipe Calderón called to dialogue with the leaders of the movement to discuss and work together to settle the issues.
Most studies agree that the invalid vote movement in the electoral process of 2009 did have a considerable impact on several Mexican cities. After this campaign, according to Sanchez (2016), the null-vote became a customary power of protest of the citizenry, creating a precedent in the next Mexican electoral processes (Cisneros 2012).
In the 2015 Mexican federal election, there had been a campaign for the null vote led by Mexican intellectuals and writers, Denise Dresser and José Antonio Crespo, who was convinced that it's better not to vote for anyone than to vote for someone (Reina 2015). Although the
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variation of the invalid vote in this electoral process has been lower than in the previous election of 2009, some supporters of invalid vote mentioned that the null vote had won over four political parties nationwide (Reina 2015).