Far-right Javier Milei, Argentina’s presidential candidate, has held a monthly raffle for his salary as a deputy since taking office in 2021. In early August, a few days before the primary elections in which the ultra-liberal economist established Most Voted, more than 2.7 million people registered online to try to earn the 702,000 pesos, about $1,920 (1,850 euros) salary earn. This populist move put him on the map and, in turn, in the midst of the umpteenth economic crisis, was the fuel he was looking for to stoke popular outrage against a political class to which he nonetheless feels he does not belong, a lawmaker his he received 30% of the vote, two percentage points more than the centre-right Juntos por el Cambio (JxC) coalition led by Patricia Bullrich and three percentage points more than the ruling Peronisme, whose candidate Sergio Massa is also Economy Minister.
Of the 7.1 million votes Milei received, many came from poor and lower-middle-class neighborhoods across the country, hardest hit by inflation that is eating away at wages. Prices have increased by 113% in the last year; the salaries of unregistered workers: 82%. Milei promises drastic public spending cuts – even more than the International Monetary Fund is calling for – that will shrink a welfare state that provides pensions, free public education and health care, and government assistance to the most disadvantaged. Not wanting to scare off voters, the far-right candidate claims – without explaining how – that the costs will be borne by a political class he describes as “parasitic, stupid (thief) and useless”.
“You earn a lot and we nothing”
Lucas, 27, and Jacqueline, 24, reached Milei via the raffle and voted for him on August 13. They live in Villa Lugano, one of the districts in the impoverished south of Buenos Aires. Milei received twice as many votes here as in the city’s more affluent northern neighborhoods, where six out of 10 voters opted for the traditionally right-wing Together for Change (JxC) party. “My interest in Milei was sparked when she said she would donate her salary. I signed up and it didn’t bother me, but then I started listening to it and seeing MPs’ salaries. “They earn a lot and we don’t earn anything,” says Lucas, who, like most respondents about his political preferences, prefers not to give his last name.
Six hours a day, Lucas and Jacqueline watch traffic in Buenos Aires to count how many vehicles are passing and what type they are. They work without a contract for a company spun off from the city government and earn around 50,000 pesos ($138). Their two jobs combined are barely enough to buy groceries, much less buy new clothes or shoes. They say they are tired of seeing politicians “fight among themselves and do nothing” to improve the situation. “The pesos are worth nothing,” criticizes Lucas.
The Argentine peso depreciated 18% on Monday after the election and recorded a 50% depreciation in 2023. The official exchange rate is 365 pesos per dollar, but on the street the US currency is being sold for more than twice that: 720 pesos. Amid the uncertainty, companies, the construction sector, the real estate market and gas stations, among others, have all rushed to raise prices.
The unchecked fall of the peso and inflation have given Milei’s star promise of dollarization wings. Many economists warn that this is not feasible, partly because the central bank does not have sufficient reserves and because it would lose a valuable monetary policy tool in crises like the recent drought. But the far-right candidate is sticking with it. He is aware that Argentine society thinks in dollars even though it earns in pesos, and that the only government in 40 years of democracy that has won the battle against inflation was that of neoliberal President Carlos Menem, who was a Passed the Convertibility Act tying the value of the peso to the dollar. No Argentine has forgotten the Corralito crisis of 2001-2002 that sparked this economic policy with record levels of poverty and unemployment, but some recall nostalgically the days of a strong peso that allowed them to travel abroad and import goods to buy.
Eloy, a van who voted for presidential candidate Javier Milei, lives in Lugano neighborhood, Buenos Aires, Argentina on August 16, 2023. ENRIQUE GARCIA MEDINA
“I want Milei to do dollarization so that there is no more inflation,” says Eloy Rojas, 33, father of two, a few meters from the Villa Lugano train station, which connects Buenos Aires with its southern periphery. He was born in Bolivia, came to Buenos Aires as a baby and now has dual citizenship. “A year ago I went to Bolivia and the prices have remained almost the same, but here everything goes up, up, up. “We need a change, that’s all there is,” he says.
Eloy has been a haulier for a few months after closing a grocery store he had run for eight years: “I worked from four in the morning until ten, ten-thirty at night and I couldn’t make it.”
abstention record
Next to him, another neighbor prepares tortillas in an old oil drum that has been converted into a grill. He listens in silence for a while before exploding, “Milei scares me, she’s not going to leave us with anything.” He fears losing the meager 40,000 pesos (about $110) disability benefit he’s receiving but still didn’t go to the polls because no political party convinced him. He was liked by more than 11 million people, 31% of voters, a record number of abstentions in the primary since its inception in 2011. Milei’s main rivals, Conservative Patricia Bullrich and Peronist Sergio Massa, are trying to help build the electorate ahead of the general election on October 22nd. The alliances they represented – the opposition Juntos por el Cambio and the pro-government Union for the Homeland – were respectively two and three points behind Milei.
Political scientist Javier Caches believes that attributing the triumph of the far right to the dissatisfaction accumulated by ten years of economic stagnation and by the failure of two governments of different portents, led by the conservative Mauricio Macri between 2015 and 2015, is an insufficient interpretation 2019 and those of his successor, the Peronist Alberto Fernández, from then to now. “It doesn’t explain why this angry vote by Milei and not by other emerging companies like e.g [el líder social] Juan Grabois,” he says.
Milei is part of a global phenomenon linked to figures such as Donald Trump in the US, Jair Bolsonaro in Brazil, José Antonio Kast in Chile, Santiago Abascal in Spain and Giorgia Meloni in Italy, among others. They look similar, but each scenario has its own peculiarities. While Trump, Abascal and Meloni focus their attacks on immigrants, the Argentine candidate aims his arrows at the state and Kirchnerism.
Anti-progressive online culture
Milei’s rise has been fueled by an anti-progressive online culture that is at odds with feminist movements. The Internet was the fertile soil on which the seed first took root. During the pandemic, she grew up among young men unhappy with hygiene restrictions and drawn to her meritocratic discourse, which advocated free-arms carrying and opposed gender politics. “I’m not going to apologize for having a penis,” is one of the controversial phrases from a candidate who isn’t opposed to organ sales and who expected that if he becomes president, he’ll shut down the Women’s Department Under other Ministry of Education, Health, Science and Social Development.
Maria Elena, retired, voted for presidential candidate Javier Milei, lives in Lugano district, Buenos Aires, Argentina on August 16, 2023. ENRIQUE GARCIA MEDINA
In less than three years Milei has spread to all walks of life, ages and genders. It won in 16 of the country’s 24 provinces. María Elena, a 61-year-old pensioner, met him through her grandchildren and voted for him because he is the only hope she sees so that her children “do not leave the country”; Gabriela, also retired, responds that it gives her the optimism for the future that she lacks now: “I don’t want a defeated country, I don’t want a sad country, I don’t want a country where everything has been sold. Our country is rich and I want to see it that way too.”
“Miilei voters don’t share the same program, it’s an identity in the making. They are united by anger and hope for change,” summarizes researcher Valeria Brusco, member of the Red de Politólogas. Brusco, who has been following Milei’s growth since 2021, points out that the extreme right is betting on individualistic solutions as opposed to the collective solution proposed by the left: “I take care of my house, my food and that they don’t break in. “
In the Libertad Avanza formula, Milei has Victoria Villarruel as her running mate, a denier of the crimes against humanity committed by the Argentine dictatorship for which more than 1,100 oppressors have been convicted, and a proponent of repealing the legalization of abortion, one of the most recent Achievements of Feminism in Argentina. “The rebellion turned to the right, as he wrote [Pablo] Stefanoni, but we had great faith in Argentina’s democratic antibodies, we thought that any look at an authoritarian project was an impassable red line,” says Caches.
Two and a half months remain until the parliamentary elections on October 22nd. If no candidate receives more than 45% of the votes, or at least 40% and a ten point difference over the second, a second ballot between the top two votes will be held on November 19th. Milei’s slump was an earthquake that shattered Argentina’s two-party system. It has also forced the losing candidates to change their strategies to face a far-right stronger than they thought.
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