Alejandra Chedraui was once part of Mexico City’s smart set, her wedding photos and family portraits appearing regularly in local newspapers’ society pages. Last week, she became a pariah.

The reason: She was one of the lawmakers who voted for President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador’s overhaul of Mexico’s judicial system, a disruptive move that’s raised concerns about Mexico’s democracy.

“Is everything that you’re going to get out of this worth what you will lose and what you’re taking away from us?” Fernanda Suarez, who owns a children’s party business in Mexico City, wrote on Instagram tagging Chedraui, whom she knows socially.

The judicial reform is causing rifts in the circles of Mexico’s elite, with group chats and social feeds erupting into heated exchanges rarely seen among the country’s genteel upper class. While they could blame the elections of Lopez Obrador and his soon-to-be successor, Claudia Sheinbaum, on the populist masses, the reform was enacted by people in their own ranks.

The bill, which Lopez Obrador signed into law on Sunday after a rancorous path through Congress and state legislatures last week, will replace most federal judges with democratically elected officials. Since Lopez Obrador and his Morena party dominate politics, that’s causing concern that the country is losing a check on power and reverting to one-party rule.

Foreign companies and governments have decried the reform as a deterrent against investment, saying biased judges wouldn’t treat their interests fairly. The peso has plummeted against the dollar as the reform marched toward passage. For well-heeled families who have raised generations of children to speak business English, the reform is a potential blow to their fortunes and a setback for Mexico’s embrace of global capitalism.

“Thanks for being part of the treason against your own country,” read an Instagram post by Maria Eugenia Rivero, owner of fine jewelry store Berthe Jewels in Mexico City. “Selfish and ambitious sellouts.”

A target of her ire was Juan Carlos Valladares, a representative from San Luis Potosi and husband of Miss Universe winner Ximena Navarrete, who like Chedraui had jumped to Morena to help advance the reform. Valladares didn’t respond to a request for comment.

‘You sank us’

In some private WhatsApp chats for parents of schoolchildren or members of country clubs, criticism of the lawmakers was met with some pushback. Some people argued that duly elected officials shouldn’t be ostracized for serving their constituencies.

And some acknowledged that the forces binding Mexico’s high society together were stronger than any political disagreement. After all, as one person put it in a country club chat: Eventually everyone ends up on the same yachts and private planes, and all will be forgotten.

Still, others said they need to call out the individuals in the legislature they know, to make sure they understand their actions have consequences.

Miguel Angel Yunes Marquez, of the opposition PAN party, earned particular derision for casting the decisive vote on the bill just days after he had vowed not to.

“You sold yourself, you sank us and defrauded those who voted for you,” Suarez wrote to Yunes in another post. Yunes and his father, a well-known political figure from the state of Veracruz, were expelled from the PAN shortly after the vote. He didn’t respond to a request for comment from Bloomberg.

Unlike Yunes, Chedraui’s foray into politics this year was her first. The lower house member lives in Mexico City, has a degree in marketing and runs a flower shop. She was appointed as a representative for the northern state of Baja California by the Ecologist Green Party. The party, a key Morena ally in Congress, had her and other 14 lawmakers officially switch to Morena in August to further cement the ruling party’s power.

Chedraui was a member of a party that had always embraced the judicial reform, so her vote was no surprise. That didn’t stop former friends and acquaintances from giving her a public lashing.

In a Facebook group, architect Cecilia Chandler tagged Chedraui’s flower shop with the word “canceled” next to it. “She obviously doesn’t live off of this,” she said. “Let’s not be a part of the destruction of what’s left of this country.”

Chedraui didn’t respond to a request for comment.

‘Profound change’

Jumping from one political party to another has a name in Mexico: chapulines, or grasshoppers in English. Alejandro Murat, a former Oaxaca governor, is one of them, a Morena member who was previously part of the powerful PRI party. He was among those taking a drubbing online after the reform passed.

“I’m not affected in the least, I’m aware of my morals and values,” Murat said in an interview with Bloomberg News when asked about the backlash against him. “The PRI that I grew up in ceased to exist and today it’s clear that Morena better represents my convictions and is consistent with my values and principles.”

The reform was the will of millions of voters who elected the majority in Congress, and the judicial system needs a “profound change” that the country’s people have demanded, he said.

“The most important part of the reform is that justice in Mexico stop being justice of privileges and turns into justice of rights,” he said.

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