Javier Milei, the highly praised right-wing populist president of Argentina, effusively embraced Donald Trump this Saturday, a day after meeting with representatives of President Joe Biden's administration in Buenos Aires. Trump and Milei were the keynote speakers at the conclusion of the Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) outside Washington. During their backstage greeting, which was captured on video posted by a member of Trump's campaign team, Milei shouted “President!” and pulled Trump into a hug before they were photographed together.
Milei took office in December after launching a Trump-inspired campaign. He wore hats that read “Make Argentina Great Again,” a reference to the former president’s “Make America Great” movement. Again (Let's Make America Great Again). He was the latest of several foreign politicians at CPAC to echo Trump's popular themes on issues such as immigration and the perceived threat of socialism.
In the video, Trump tells Milei in English, “Let's make Argentina great again,” and Milei then shouts his famous line in Spanish, “Long live freedom, damn it,” according to AP reports.
The Argentine president's presentation at CPAC came a day after meeting Secretary of State Antony Blinken. A senior Milei official claimed that Marc Stanley, the US ambassador to Buenos Aires, suggested that Milei not speak at CPAC.
Milei's security minister, Patricia Bullrich, who also attended the meeting in southern Washington, said Stanley told Milei's office that he believed the conference was “very political” and that it was not appropriate for him to attend. Bullrich clarified that Milei would give a general speech and not talk about the election.
Milei urged CPAC attendees to stop socialism and not support further regulation of the economy. He also called abortion access “a killer agenda” to reduce the population. “Don’t get carried away by the siren song of social justice,” he said in Spanish. “Don’t give up your freedom. Fight for your freedom. If they don’t fight for freedom, they will be driven into misery,” reports Efe.
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Trump then presented himself as a “proud political dissident.” “Today I stand before you not only as your former and hopefully future president, but also as a proud political dissident. “I am a dissident,” the former Republican president said without hesitation.
Since the death of Russian political dissident Alexei Navalny a week ago in the prison where he was being held – a death for which the US government blames Vladimir Putin – Trump has embraced comparisons with him.
While Navalny served a prison sentence for his criticism of Putin, Trump faces 91 criminal charges and faces four civil lawsuits for crimes such as bribery, attempting to invalidate an election and illegally storing secret documents.
Figures from the national and international far right attended the Conservative Political Action Conference. Among them were El Salvador's President Nayib Bukele; Argentine President Milei; the president of the Spanish far-right party Vox, Santiago Abascal or the son of former Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro, Eduardo Bolsonaro.
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