The Canal de Televisión del Congreso de los Estados Unidos Mexicanos (''Television Channel of the Congress of the United Mexican States''), shortened to Canal del Congreso (''Congress Channel''), is a television channel in

Mexico Mexico, officially the United Mexican States, is a country in North America. It is the northernmost country in Latin America, and borders the United States to the north, and Guatemala and Belize to the southeast; while having maritime boundar ...

that broadcasts the sessions of both houses of the

Congress of the Union The Congress of the Union (, ), formally known as the General Congress of the United Mexican States (''Congreso General de los Estados Unidos Mexicanos''), is the legislature of the federal government of Mexico. It consists of two chambers: t ...

. It is available on all Mexican cable and satellite systems, as well as over-the-air in

Mexico City Mexico City is the capital city, capital and List of cities in Mexico, largest city of Mexico, as well as the List of North American cities by population, most populous city in North America. It is one of the most important cultural and finan ...

on digital television station XHHCU-TDT channel 45. Created in 1998 under the LVII Legislature of the Mexican Congress, the Canal del Congreso broadcasts its congressional programming as well as other politically oriented programs. It has studio facilities in both the Chamber of Deputies and the Senate, and it is governed by a bicameral commission (Spanish: ''Comisión Bicameral del Canal de Television del Congreso de la Unión''). In 2000, it began full-time transmissions on cable systems, expanding to satellite in 2001. At the beginning of the

LVIII Legislature of the Mexican Congress The LVIII Legislature of the Congress of the Union of Mexico (58th Congress) met from 1 September 2000 to 31 August 2003. All 628 members of the two chambers of Congress were elected in the elections of July 2000. Senators of the LVIII Legisla ...

, the Bicameral Commission worked to achieve a milestone for the channel: the Comisión Federal de Telecomunicaciones, then the television regulator in the country, required all cable systems to carry it. On March 10, 2010,

Cofetel The Federal Commission of Telecommunications (Comisión Federal de Telecomunicaciones) (CoFeTel) was the regulator of telecommunications in Mexico, and was part of the Mexico's Secretariat of Communications and Transport (SCT). Formed in 1996 and ...

awarded it a concession to start XHHCU-TDT, a digital-only station broadcasting from

Cerro del Chiquihuite Cerro del Chiquihuite (Chiquihuite Hill) is a hill located in the north of Mexico City, in the borough of Gustavo A. Madero, D.F., Gustavo A. Madero and bordering the municipality of Tlalnepantla de Baz in the State of Mexico. The hill has a heig ...

, to carry the Canal del Congreso signal over the air in Mexico City. Channel 45 went on air on June 24, 2010. In 2013, the channel's director general, Leticia Salas Torres, stated that she wishes to expand Canal del Congreso's over-the-air reach outside Mexico City."El Canal del Congreso busca transmisión abierta," Notimex, 24 March 2013

/ref> The first step in this process was Canal del Congreso's addition to ten transmitters of the Sistema Público de Radiodifusión del Estado Mexicano (SPR) in 2016. The SPR transmitters that carry Canal del Congreso use

PSIP The Program and System Information Protocol (PSIP) is the MPEG (Moving Picture Experts Group, a video and audio industry group) and privately defined program-specific information originally defined by General Instrument for the DigiCipher 2 system ...

to display it on television receivers as channel 45.1.

References

External links

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Bicameral Commission home page
{{Parliamentary broadcasters Television channels and stations established in 1998 Legislature broadcasters 1998 establishments in Mexico Public television in Mexico Spanish-language television stations in Mexico