A public feud between the son of Mexico’s former president and the owner of broadcaster TV Azteca escalated on Monday, 9 November. Andrés Manuel López Beltrán, known as Andy, answered Ricardo Salinas Pliego with a video of more than 30 minutes and a list of questions about Salinas’s business history.
Who Is Involved
Andrés Manuel López Beltrán is a member of Morena, Mexico’s governing party, and the son of Andrés Manuel López Obrador, who was president until 2024. Ricardo Salinas Pliego owns TV Azteca, one of Mexico’s two largest national broadcasters alongside Televisa, a rival network, and the wider Grupo Salinas, his business group in retail, banking and media.
Salinas Pliego had posed questions to López Beltrán before this reply. López Beltrán answers them in the video.
Office towers along Paseo de la Reforma in Mexico City. Photo: Carlos Valenzuela, CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia CommonsWhat López Beltrán Said
In the video, López Beltrán said he paid for his 2025 trip to Japan with his own money from legitimate income. He called Salinas Pliego a vulture and said he is the target of a defamation campaign against him.
He then posed questions of his own. They cover the 1993 sale of Imevisión, the state broadcaster that became TV Azteca, and the money used to buy it.
López Beltrán asked who set the sale price and whether the company was worth at least ten times what was paid. He also asked whether it was immoral to accept money from Raúl Salinas de Gortari, a businessman and brother of Carlos Salinas de Gortari, who was president while the company was being sold.
Salinas Pliego has publicly acknowledged receiving about US$30 million from Raúl Salinas de Gortari toward the purchase, which he calls a loan that he has repaid. López Beltrán’s questions about the sale are his own claims, not findings by a court.
Why It Matters Beyond Mexico
TV Azteca has dollar bonds, debt securities held by investors, and its debts are being fought over in courts in Mexico and New York. The company is also in a court-supervised insolvency process in Mexico, a restructuring that is not an automatic bankruptcy.
The exchange also shows how openly López Beltrán and Salinas Pliego, the owner of TV Azteca, now trade accusations. Readers in Mexico will watch for his reply, which had not appeared at publication.
Avenida de la República in central Mexico City, 2020. Photo: Carlos Valenzuela, CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia CommonsWhat Is Not Known
Only López Beltrán’s side of the exchange was available at publication. His points are his own claims, not established facts.
What It Means for You
For readers following Mexican politics or TV Azteca’s debt, this is a public accusation from one side, not new evidence. Watch for a reply from Salinas Pliego and for any court filing in the insolvency case.
Earlier Rio Times reports cover the insolvency ruling and the US debt lawsuit