Voters appear to have responded to idea that US president’s ‘generosity’ would evaporate if Milei failed to win
Voters appear to have responded to idea that US president’s ‘generosity’ would evaporate if Milei failed to win
“The dollar always talks in the end,” Donald Trump wrote in his 1987 bestseller The Art of the Deal.
Javier Milei’s surprise triumph in Argentina’s midterm elections – after Trump bailed him out with 40bn of them – suggests there may be some truth to that assertion.
The US president had vowed to jettison his South American ally if, as widely predicted, the radical libertarian fared badly in Sunday’s make-or-break legislative vote. “If he doesn’t win, we’re gone,” Trump declared when Argentina’s shaggy-haired president visited him in Washington earlier this month to plead for economic help.
Milei’s political woes have been building in recent months, with growing public frustration over Argentina’s sluggish economy translating into market jitters and a pasting in Buenos Aires’ provincial election in September. Trump stepped in after that humiliating result, offering a $20bn (£15bn) currency swap deal and a further $20bn in support for an economy he claimed was “dying” – although the US president indicated such “generosity” would evaporate if Milei failed to win big on Sunday.
Milei’s opponents accused Trump of flagrantly meddling in Argentina’s electoral process with his explicit message to voters. Some predicted an anti-Trump backlash, similar to the one felt in neighbouring Brazil as a result of Washington’s ham-fisted attempt to force its authorities to abandon the coup trial of former president Jair Bolsonaro.
