In the Chamber of Deputies election, the Party of the Mexican Revolution (Partido de la Revolución Mexicana, PRM) won all but one of the 173 seats.

The decision was made due to Ávila Camacho's perceived conciliatory nature and the fact that he was a devout Catholic, which was crucial to defuse tensions between the Party and the Catholic Church in the aftermath of the bloody Cristero War, as well as to appeal to the conservative sectors of the country which had fiercely opposed Cárdenas social reforms.

We had barely avoided a civil war and we were putting up with tremendous international pressure due to the oil expropriation.

A former revolutionary combatant who later served as Communications Minister under Pascual Ortiz Rubio's administration and accumulated great wealth from construction works, Almazán presented himself as a right-wing candidate who would put an end to the "Comunazi degeneration" of the Cárdenas administration, although he promised to maintain the social reforms in case he won.

A group of Almazán's supporters attempted to get into the National Palace to protest against the alleged electoral fraud that was taking place.