It’s interesting to note that most political analysts forecasted a surprising outcome in Argentina’s stunning PASO primaries that saw ultra-libertarian economist Javier Milei take the victory, yet none of them predicted he’d actually win. Indeed, Milei’s electoral triumph over Juntos por el Cambio and Unión por la Patria was so complete that it included victories in all but eight districts, including, of course, Buenos Aires City — historical bastion of Mauricio Macri’s PRO party — and Buenos Aires Province — where Cristina Fernández de Kirchner is trying to protect her sphere of influence. Milei’s win continues to reverberate through the socio-political ecosystem, leaving his opponents scrambling to figure out how to reconfigure their electoral strategies ahead of the general election scheduled for October 22. His confidence is so high that he’s speaking about a first-round victory, a turn of events that appeared unthinkable just a few weeks ago, and in great part is generating a positive feedback loop for the libertarian who sees his aura grow with each passing day. Whether or not all of this is an illusion or Argentina’s version of extravagant far-right outsider ala Donald Trump and Jair Bolsonaro remains to be seen.
There are a few macro trends that are unquestionable and must be acknowledged before venturing into any form of analysis. Milei took 30 percent of the vote at the national level, followed by Juntos por el Cambio with 28.3 percent (17 percent for Patricia Bullrich and 11.3 percent for Horacio Rodríguez Larreta), and Unión por la Patria with 27.3 percent (Sergio Massa with 21.4 percent and Juan Grabois with 5.9 percent). Behind the three leading coalitions came blank votes (4.8 percent) in an election where only 69.6 percent of the electorate showed up to vote, despite ballot-casting being obligatory.
Support authors and subscribe to content
This is premium stuff. Subscribe to read the entire article.