Pressured due to allegations of corruption at the National Disability Agency (andis) involving his sister and secretary general presidency, Karina Milei, Argentine president Javier Milei, has lived his most troubled political moment since he arrived at Casa Rosada in December 2023.
The libertarian’s first attempt to overcome this crisis takes place this Sunday (7), when elections will be held to 46 of the 92 chairs in the Chamber of Deputies of the Province of Buenos Aires and to 23 of the 46 seats in the Bonaerense Senate.
Legislative elections of the most populous Argentine province are always closely monitored by Casa Rosada, but this year have gained extra importance.
In addition to representing an attempt by Milei to start ending the political crisis, this Sunday’s claim is the first provincial legislative election of Buenos Aires since 2003 to be held at a different date from national legislative elections.
Thus, the Bonaerense elections are being viewed as a kind of preview of 26 October, when the Argentines will choose the occupants of 127 of the 257 chairs of the Chamber of Deputies and 24 of the Senate 72 seats.
With the party of Milei, freedom advances (LLA, in the acronym in Spanish), in minority in both national houses, the president has suffered defeats in the legislature, which makes the vote next month for him to take advantage of his projects.
Another factor that apes Buenos Aires’ provincial legislative elections this year is that the current governor, peronist Axel Kicillof, is being quoted to be Milei’s opponent in the 2027 presidential dispute.
Although Kicillof’s position is not in dispute on Sunday (he was reelected in 2023), the result of the provincial election will be the first thermometer of the possible clash with the libertarian president in two years.
Acts of violence occurred during the campaign. During the LLA caravan in the city of Lomas de Zamora, on August 27, stones and plastic bottles were thrown towards Milei, who had to leave the place. The Argentine presidency attributed the attack on Kirchnerist militants.
Last Wednesday (3), before and after the rally that ended the LLA campaign, in the city of Moreno, militants clashed, a bottle was shot against a journalist and stones were launched against the presidential car.
There were also riots at the Faculty of Law of the University of Buenos Aires (UBA) and Corrientes, where provincial elections were held on August 31.
At the event in Moreno, Milei celebrated the fact that the LLA appears in a technical draw (in Argentina, the vote is on a closed list) with the peronists in the research for the legislative election of Buenos Aires province (a traditional peronian stronghold) and has again claimed that complaints against Karina have political motivation.
“In total despair, they [peronistas] They are behind my family. Imagine how things should be in Buenos Aires province, to the point of moving with my sister. They are scared, and on Sunday we will paint the province of purple, ”said Milei in the rally, citing the lla symbol.
