Javier Milei’s Great Opportunity

Last Sunday’s midterm elections in Argentina were the great challenge that Javier Milei and his model had to face after winning the presidential elections in 2023. Not only was the consolidation of his political force, La Libertad Avanza, at stake, but also the democratic recovery of the Republic. The result of elections was decisive in determining the new course of a country engulfed by a deep crisis that has dragged on for generations. It was clear that for Milei, winning would be an opportunity to place Argentina once again on the path of development and growth so that it would retake its rightful place among the leading nations in the international framework.

The overwhelming and unexpected electoral victory achieved by the ruling party unquestionably signalled renewed confidence from the electorate in the government project. The alliance La Libertad Avanza obtained almost 41% of the votes at the national level, surpassing Fuerza Patria by nine points: 9,337,665 libertarian votes against 7,276,429 of the Kirchnerist Peronism.

The extent of the victory is stunning: La Libertad Avanza has become the most voted-for force at the national level, and it won in 16 districts. Milei swept Peronism away, with hardly anybody foreseeing it. His movement managed to win even in the province of Buenos Aires, a historic Peronist bastion, today submerged in misery, corruption, and violence, with an absolute lack of public security that its citizens suffer daily.

At the polls the majority of Argentines have made clear what they do not want, what they categorically reject: to continue being governed by Kirchnerism. In the last twenty-two years, Néstor Kirchner (2003-2007), Cristina Fernández de Kirchner (2007-2015), and Alberto Fernández (2019-2023) have passed through the Casa Rosada, the historic headquarters of Argentine presidents. These two decades of misgovernance have left the country mired in the most shameful poverty and geopolitically aligned with some of the most repugnant narco-dictatorships and tyrannies in the world.