Cuauhtémoc Cárdenas Solórzano was a Mexican politician, and the founder of the PRD political party.
He was a prominent member of the PRI, but left the party in the 1980s along with Francisco Ovando Hernández due to its connections with drug traffickers. He ran against his former party in the 1988 presidential elections, but lost due to a narrow margin which was a result of voter suppression tactics perpetrated by the PRI and interference from the Guadalajara cartel, which supported the PRI.