Sometimes dressed as a vigilante from a Marvel comic, the Argentine president-elect Javier Milei did not miss the opportunity to rant against what he called a corrupt caste that encompassed the state and the Argentine elite. His electoral campaign managed to channel the fatigue of an electorate against all established political parties and the companies and banks that sponsor them.
But less than a week after its historic victory in last Sunday’s presidential elections, the libertarian revolution has signed a modus vivendi with part of the political establishment. Milei has incorporated into her government the economic brains of former president and powerful billionaire businessman Mauricio Macri, as well as the leader of the Together for Change coalition, Patricia Bullrich.
Luis ‘Tuto’ Caputo, the former Minister of Economy whom Macri described during his government (2015-2019) as the “Messi of the economy”, will be Minister of Finance after taking office on December 10. The incorporation of the former Deutsche Bank and JP Morgan executive into the government coincides with the departure of Emilio Ocampo, a libertarian economist and staunch defender of dollarization, the central promise of Milei’s campaign. Ocampo will no longer be the president of the Central Bank with the task of eliminating the peso – “excrement”, according to Milei – and adopting the dollar.
It remains to be seen if the dollarization plan is definitively defended alongside Ocampo. At the moment, Milei – who used to display at her election rallies a huge dollar bill with her own portrait instead of George Washington – has said that the conditions for adopting the dollar are not met.
Bullrich, for his part, will occupy the Security portfolio, a snub to Victoria Villarruel, who aspired to control the three areas of Security, Intelligence and Defense. The vice president-elect – a revisionist of the history of the military dictatorship – has also had to swallow the fact that Bullrich, in her youth, was a member of the Montonera guerrilla.
All of this is the result of the so-called Acassuso pact – reached in the meeting held between Macri, Milei and the leaders of Together for Change at the end of October at Macri’s home in the Acassuso district, in Buenos Aires. The agreement delivered the votes of part of the center right to Milei, the key to his victory. Likewise, it will guarantee part of the votes of the center-right parties in Congress where the libertarians have less than 15% of the seats. After a campaign of inflammatory rhetoric, Milei is already talking about pragmatism.
But, although dollarization already seems like the delusional dream of an alter ego already erased from history, there is no reason to think that the pact with Macrism is going to substantially change Milei’s radical program of privatization and draconian cuts to the state. Ultimately, Macri shares the libertarian vision of a mega adjustment as a solution to the problems of the Argentine economy: uncontrolled inflation and a state that – according to a former IMF official – “has a European level of public spending but without taxes.” Europeans.”
It is too early to know if the libertarian revolution has been swallowed up by Macriism. There are different opinions. “It feels like Milei has been eaten by sharks; “It was necessary to generate electricity, now it is known that he is a genuflecting politician,” said Ariel Goldstein, author of the book La Reconquista authoritaria (Marea 2022). Son of a family from Calabria, Macri “is an expert in the mafia method; and Milei is a kind of front man,” said Rocco Carbone, Italian-Argentine philosopher at the National Council for Scientific and Technical Research (CONICET), in Buenos Aires.
In this framework of interpretation, Milei has done an invaluable favor to Macri, who became ineligible when his government squandered a huge IMF rescue package of more than $50 billion in 2019, many of which leaked into funds’ offshore’. Upon leaving power in 2019, Macri left the country more indebted and with inflation close to 50%.
Macri’s credibility crisis deepened after the leak of the Panama Papers, which revealed that he had evaded taxes. La Vanguardia has been able to verify after accessing these documents that Luis Caputo – the man who designed the issuance of debt in dollars that has become a ticking time bomb – carried out illegal operations in Panama. Macri had no possibility of returning to the presidency through the front door and Milei has allowed him to do so through the back door.
Others think Milei will be reluctant to cede more power to Macri. “Anyone who thinks that Macri is going to manage Milei by remote control should think again,” said Gabriel Domara, author of two books about Macri in the newspaper Página 12.
Macri belongs to one of the richest families in Argentina, whose assets exceed 500 million dollars, according to Forbes magazine. Former president of the Boca Juniors football club, the former president intends to regain control of the club in next week’s elections and many believe that his ambition is to preside over FIFA. No one doubts that he will exert strong pressure on Milei to achieve his goals.
But Milei has other godparents in the caste. Eduardo Eurnekian, magnate of Armenian origin and founder of the Corporación América holding company, with 3,700 employees and interests in the oil and gas sector, infrastructure and transportation, mining, technology, agribusiness and real estate. Eurnekian has been the true godfather of Milei, who rose to fame on television talk shows as an economist who defended Eurnekian’s emporium.
Several ministers in the new government, including the Minister of the Interior, Guillermo Francos, have been employees of Corporación América. It remains to be seen which part of the business caste exercises the most influence over a president who called himself an anarcho-capitalist.
