Congressional elections in Argentina

Following the poor performance of Javier Milei's La Libertad Avanza party in the regional elections in the province of Buenos Aires in September (see our article in Newsletter #10) and various corruption scandals in the president's immediate circle, the opposition to Milei had pinned its hopes on the congressional elections on October 26. But things turned out differently. Gabriela Mitidieri and Robert Grosse (both at Centro de Estudios Legales y Sociales - Cels, Buenos Aires) had already reported in our Newsletter #10 that during a visit to the US, Milei received “whatever it takes” backing from Trump and promises of concessions from the IMF. In the event of his election victory, these promises were to amount to a total cash injection of up to US$40 billion.

In the congressional elections on October 26, half of the seats in the Chamber of Deputies and one-third of the seats in the Senate were up for reelection. Milei's LLA party was ahead in almost all provinces. Nationwide, the LLA performed significantly better than the Peronist center-left party Fuerza Patria, with a total of around 42 percent of the vote compared to 28.5 percent. This means that the ruling LLA party will hold a third of the seats in parliament in the future and thus a blocking minority. This will enable it to override opposition vetoes in Congress against presidential decrees. “However, Milei still does not have a majority in parliament; he is 22 votes short. He will have to be willing to negotiate,” write Frederic Schnatterer and Torge Löding in jw.

Michael Álvarez Kalverkamp of the Heinrich Böll Foundation speaks of a debacle for the Peronist opposition Fuerza Patria (FP). He highlights the historically low voter turnout of 69 percent despite compulsory voting and describes how a fear campaign against the return of the Peronists was able to take hold. Apparently, the “fear of the end of macroeconomic stability, which is still precarious, and a return to Kirchnerist ‘left-wing’ Peronism” ultimately outweighed doubts about the course and behavior of the right-wing libertarian president.

Redacción: Ulli Jentsch