by After the hug, the public reconciliation and the meeting alone with Pope Francis in the Vatican, Javier Milei returned to Argentina on Tuesday. In Rome he had been seen relaxed, excited, mystical. But when the ITA Airways flight AZ-680 landed in Ezeiza, the other Milei emerged again. “He came back in incendiary mode,” said one of the people who knows him best, in denotative language. Already during the air journey she had fueled the controversy with Lali Espósito and had “liked” posts with memes that ridiculed the artist. That night, the night of her return, she met at her ultra-small table at the Olivos Residence. Since she is not too attracted to eating, especially when there is work involved, the three summoned officials had dinner before attending: her sister and general secretary of the Presidency, Karina; his star guru, Santiago Caputo; and the Chief of Staff, Nicolás Posse. They are the power.
The meeting will last until after eleven at night. The strategy of sending to Congress, in a fractional manner, some of the initiatives that foundered when the Omnibus Law failed, began to be addressed there. There was also talk of the measures that were going to be promoted during the week: among them, the elimination of trust funds for some two billion dollars – which the ruling party associates with the black boxes of politics – and the removal of subsidies to the social works, which promises to reheat the fight with the CGT.
There was also talk about the need to send a labor reform project to Parliament, which, although it was included in the DNU, is currently being stopped by Justice. In all topics, the communication axes were raised, a weapon that mileism considers lethal. In this design, the search for an enemy frequently appears that allows those who want “change” to be placed on one side and, on the other, those who promote the status quo, “the caste.” The new and the old, Jaime Durán Barba could summarize it. The comparison is worth it. Santiago Caputo is one of the Ecuadorian’s disciples.
They swear that the Lali issue was not discussed that night in Olivos. It wasn’t necessary. That remained from the first moment. in the exclusive hands of the president, which manages the X network from the same cell phone with which it speaks with Emmanuel Macron or Giorgia Meloni. Once, a few days after taking office, they brought her a new, encrypted cell phone and asked her if she wanted to leave the management of the networks to the care of her advisors. Milei only appeared with Instagram and TikTok. “Twitter is mine“, said. They never proposed it again. Milei spends a lot of time browsing the network of her admired Elon Musk. She can write, retweet, publish notes from portals and even greet users with very few followers on their birthday.
Even looking at the advantage of not being part of the content, None of the members of his court circle found the controversy with Lali serious., whom the head of state called “Lali deposit”, associating her with the recitals that were paid for with public funds. “It doesn’t seem to us that she went too far, she didn’t say anything out of this world,” her collaborators said. The character Lali is the least important thing, what is relevant is what she generates around her.”
For them, it is a cultural battle that they consider essential. Milei would come to undress – always according to the logic of La Libertad Avanza – a social network that includes politicians, artists, journalists and men and women of culture who move in tune with Kirchnerism so that nothing changes. “Revelation principle. “Many are Kirchnerists even if they don’t know it.”they claim.
The controversy with the actress and singer was all the rage in A work by Scidata Argentina revealed that between Monday and Saturday at noon, the dispute generated 634,300 mentions in X, that is, it accounted for 54.1% of the conversation. Inflation, for example, despite the fact that Indec published the January index on Wednesday (20.6%) it yielded 130,400 comments, 11.1% of what was said on the network, and on Valentine’s Day only 88,300 mentions, 7.5%. This type of metrics is what they follow in La Rosada. They will not notice the language or the aggressiveness.
What was not in the Government’s calculations was Cristina’s reappearance. On Wednesday at 7 o’clock in the morning, the former president surprised by publishing on her networks a document with strong criticism of the current administration, which she titled “Argentina in its third debt crisis.” She had been working on the text since January. Many leaders passed through her office on the first floor of the Patria Institute and provided information. The voice that he heard the most was that of Axel Kicillof (not only in economics, but also, for example, in the chapter on how to rethink the health system), although at the same time he consulted less relevant leaders, such as deputy Julia Strada and The economist Hernán Letcher.
His idea was to present it in March, when three months had passed since the change of government, and at a time when – he speculated – the honeymoon between the winner of the runoff against Sergio Massa and the 56% who voted for him would begin to lose appeal. An unexpected event altered her. The journalist Roberto Navarro told last week on his program what was, supposedly, Cristina’s intimate thoughts.
“She believes that Milei is today the politician who is doing things best in terms of political technique,” said the journalist. The video went viral. Christian happiness and the establishment interpreted that the journalist had spoken with Cristina. That talk should not be ruled out, but she cursed him in front of her confidants. “They misrepresent me”, he pointed out. And he sped up the document.
Criticisms of the management direction abounded in the text. She said that the adjustment will lead to a destabilization plan and she proposed a series of changes, including many that she did not even dare to discuss when she was president or vice president of Alberto Fernández. Or that she directly blocked, such as updating the labor system. He also treated Milei as a showman. And Milei didn’t dislike it.
Cristina seemed to stick her nose into the negotiation that La Libertad Avanza is plotting with the PRO. She maintained that it was not even necessary for Mauricio Macri or Patricia Bullrich to play for him in the runoff. “The displacement of votes would still have occurred,” she reasoned. The former president even left open the possibility of accompanying some of Milei’s projects in Congress.
The president believes that Cristina is trying to prevent the alliance because she fears a hurricane of votes against in 2025. This is: Milei is already talking, without saying it explicitly, about an electoral merger with the PRO. For some, it is logical: Can anyone imagine Bullrich supporting a list other than the one promoted by the government of which it is a part? He could only reverse that scenario if a political cataclysm occurs.
The radicals, partners of the Macrismo since 2015, and a sector of the PRO, represented by Horacio Rodríguez Larreta, will have to decide what to do, regardless of whether the conversations between the ruling party and the Macrismo are delayed. Elisa Carrió’s Civic Coalition saw her coming: several months ago she slammed the door.
In the Casa Rosada there was a kind of euphoria due to the reappearance of the head of Unión por la Patria. Perhaps, the need. Although there are variables that the Government can celebrate (calmness in the markets, the accumulation of reserves, the financial surplus and the reduction in country risk), There are numbers that are shocking. In January, to not be poor, a family needed income of $596,823. According to a report from the Di Tella University, in the last three months there were 3.6 million people who fell into poverty, which is equivalent to about 22 million and, for the UCA Observatory, poverty would already be at 57 %, the highest in 20 years.
How far will the threshold of social tolerance for adjustment reach? It is a question that runs from Balcarce 50 to the offices of the most powerful businessmen in the country.
The public discussion, first with Lali and then with Cristina, helped divert attention. It never hurts for the cuckoo to show its head, the libertarians ironized, after Cristina’s tweet. Milei printed all 33 pages. She read them almost with delight. She reeled off point by point, making handwritten notes, arrows and corrections. With that draft in hand she waited for the three LN + journalists who had agreed to an interview with him that Wednesday.
The temptation of a fight with Cristina is always there. Macri can say it. Although it must be recognized that Milei can challenge Cristina with the same impetus as she does with a pop star, with a deputy whom she accuses of being corrupt or with an anonymous user of X. “They are not going to tame him,” they promise at her side .
The governors are on the warpath. Martín Llaryora from Cordoba came out to strongly question him this week. An abysmal difference with his predecessor, Juan Schiaretti, who was irritated by the Buenos Aires media. Many Peronist leaders could imitate Llaryora in the short term. Milei demands an adjustment. They want a fiscal pact. The Government changed after the Omnibus Law fell.
The leaders of Together for Change, more similar than the Peronists, are also on alert. On Friday there was a Zoom. There were 9 of the 10 (only Gustavo Valdés did not participate) and all of them ended the dialogue with Milei’s interlocutors. “Was over. “We will only speak with the President”they agreed
These nine governors prepare two arguments to try to seduce him: they will tell him that they are willing to make a greater adjustment in their accounts and they will hammer home the waste of discretionary shipments that were made to the provinces during the K era. In exchange, he seeks greater tax sharing. Milei, for now, says no. How dare they.
