BUENOS AIRES, Argentina (AP) — What many deemed impossible just months ago is reality: right-wing populist Javier Milei resoundingly won Argentina’s presidency.
What many deemed impossible just months ago is reality: right-wing populist Javier Milei resoundingly won Argentina’s presidency.
And with his victory Sunday night, the fiery freshman lawmaker has thrust the country into the unknown regarding just how extreme his policies will be, following a campaign that saw him revving a chainsaw to symbolically cut the state down to size.
With almost all votes tallied, Milei handily beat Economy Minister Sergio Massa, 55.7% to 44.3%. Milei won all but three of the nation’s 24 provinces and Massa had conceded even before the electoral authority began announcing preliminary results.
Milei, 53, a self-described anarcho-capitalis t with a disheveled mop of hair, made his name by furiously denouncing the “political caste” on television programs. His pledge for abrupt, severe change resonated with Argentines weary of annual inflation soaring above 140% and a poverty rate that reached 40%. He will take power on Dec. 10.
Once in office, he has said he will slash government spending, dollarize the economy and eliminate the Central Bank as well as key ministries, including those of health and education. An admirer of former U.S. President Donald Trump, he has likewise presented himself as a crusader against the sinister creep of global socialism with plans to purge the government of corrupt establishment politicians. In the weeks before the runoff, though, he walked back some of his more unpopular proposals, such as loosening gun controls and sweeping, indiscriminate privatization.
“Hang on to your hat,” Benjamin Gedan, director of the Latin America Program at the Washington-based Wilson Center, told The Associated Press by phone. “Milei has toned down his anti-establishment rage lately and downplayed his more outlandish proposals, but it’s going to be a wild ride, given his combative style, inexperience and the few allies he has in Congress.”
Supporters celebrated Sunday night outside Milei’s headquarters in downtown Buenos Aires, drinking beer and chanting as fireworks went off overhead. They waved both Argentine flags and the yellow Gadsden flag, emblazoned with the words “Don’t Tread On Me,” which Milei’s movement has adopted as its own.
“We no longer want the past; we are betting on the future,” said Ezequiel Fanelli, 45, who works for an insurance company and had a Gadsden flag in hand.
