Argentina 2023 election

[Red Velvet]

The shooter was a 35 year old Brazilian who lives in Argentina for 20 years and is naturalized Argentinian. Had previous criminal records in Argentina.

In his social media page, he has a picture of Javier Milei in his header and posts in favor of Jair Bolsonaro, where he displays being an enthusiast of Brazil’s economy minister being a Chicago Boy.

Far-right politically motivated violence on the rise.

[Red Velvet]

How do you see Millei in this?

He’s probably winning tbh. It’s either him or the JxC option and he’s the more “exciting” option. If I had to guess based on the trends we usually see in these scenarios, is that the trend until the election is for the vote intention for Milei to grow while the JxC one goes down.

I actually think Frente de Todos has very decent chances of going to a presidential runoff even with a lesser known option considering that there will be SOME later last minute opposition to conservative project during election time and that the right-wing vote will be overwhelming this year, but also very divided between Milei vs JxC. But they will inevitably lose in second round to whoever they go up against.

I miss the 00s, apparently Brazil and Argentina cannot ever get aligned governments for more than a year these days. Just as Brazil gets rid of our crazy far-right guy, Argentina gets theirs.

[Red Velvet]

The polling average up to this point:

Goes in line with my early prediction of a FdT vs Milei runoff. Still very early and I imagine this trend of JxC going down in favor of Milei goes all the way until election day.

That’s the long term trend you’ve been seeing in the graphic anyway.

[Red Velvet]

That CFK voter learning Cristina wasn’t running and saying he would vote Milei isn’t surprising at all. People overestimate a lot how ideological the vote really is.

Media exposure is more an important factor for the masses than people give credit for. People will pick from the ones they know exist and seem to be bigger options depending on how much they are discussed around.

[Red Velvet]

Looking like both FdT (former, they apparently changed names?) and JxC could finish with around 40%, going to a runoff where JxC will easily win by getting the Milei vote tbh.

https://twitter.com/AmericaElige/status/1679270932278398976
It’s currently a trend of Milei falling down in the polls, thank god. I believe that even if Argentina is currently more susceptible to stuff like rise of extremism because of economic hardships, as a country it’s less susceptible to outsiders. You either have the Peronists or the main opposition to Peronists.

But also, the far-right rise also seems to have cooled down somewhat, at least in LatAm. Europe is a different thing.

Massa finishing above 40%, maybe even close to 45% in a runoff would be a victory in my eyes considering everyone’s early expectations. 21% null or undecided will probably drop as the elections nears though.

[Red Velvet]

I don’t think anyone out of the center-right coalition is winning the actual election, probably Bullrich, but still hoping for a Massa overperformance today.

[Red Velvet]

I don’t think anyone out of the center-right coalition is winning the actual election, probably Bullrich, but still hoping for a Massa overperformance today.

Why do you hate Argentina so much?

They're Brazilian

Lmao do they have any better option? Bullrich or Milei are big NOs to me. So go Massa!

More like Argentina consistently hates Argentina itself.

[Red Velvet]

Milei overperformance wouldn’t be surprising at all. They tried Macri and it didn’t work so they went with Fernandez and economic situation kept going worse.

If anything, I’m positively surprised they lasted this long without falling to a hardcore right-wing weirdo. Other places needed much less of a push.

[Red Velvet]

Milei overperformance wouldn’t be surprising at all.

It would, these are primary elections and Milei doesn't have any relevant party structure behind him.

He doesn’t but he has the context and THE outsider narrative in middle of a terrible situation no one seems to have any answer for. They already tried JxC with Macri and Peronists with Fernandez.

We’ve all seen this before. From the outside, we were all just hoping Argentinians were more level headed than its neighbors and would go with JxC before going for the weirdo.

I don’t judge them if it happens because when you feel like you’re in the bottom of the pit, it’s natural to think that you cannot fall even more. It’s possible though.

Also, it’s not an election where Argentinian have a real good option to pick from. Unlike say, Brazil election where the debate was severely dumbified and you had a “both sides” narrative between the best or 2nd best president we ever had and literally Satan.

Their excuses for going batsh**t crazy are way better or at least more understandable than the ones we ever had - it was really more like pure evil mixed with stupidity from actors on our side. I don’t think like that of Argentina at all.

But let’s see how a Milei presidency would actually be like before doom predictions. Personally, I think most of his proposals are completely insane, but Argentina already IS in an insane situation, so who knows?

[Red Velvet]

Former Brazilian president, currently ineligible, Jair Bolsonaro has made a video endorsing Milei recently this week: “We share a lot in common”.

It contrasts with the attemps of current Brazilian president Lula of trying to help Massa, the peronist candidate.

JxC - PSDB
Milei - Bolsonaro
Peronists - PT

[Red Velvet]

Milei overperformance wouldn’t be surprising at all.

It would, these are primary elections and Milei doesn't have any relevant party structure behind him.

He doesn’t but he has the context and THE outsider narrative in middle of a terrible situation no one seems to have any answer for. They already tried JxC with Macri and Peronists with Fernandez.

We’ve all seen this before. From the outside, we were all just hoping Argentinians were more level headed than its neighbors and would go with JxC before going for the weirdo.

Brazil never had anything similar to Peronism. Bolsonaro's triumph was unusual but not impossible considering a priori how weak the Brazilian party system is. This is completely different and absolutely mind blowing.

This has already been challenged by Macri’s own election though.

Though unprecedented, a Milei victory shouldn’t be surprising at all. The partisan system works on propelling JxC as the main opposition to the Peronists but Argentina has already elected Macri and clearly disliked him a lot.

Wanting an outsider from that shouldn’t be surprising when you look at how catastrophic their economic situation currently is. If their partisan system wasn’t that well-rounded, Milei would’ve been polling around 50% for a looong time now. It can somewhat repress it but not stop it if people are sick and tired of the two main options.

Btw, the partisan system in Brazil, as fragmented as it is, only looks more unpredictable AFTER PSDB losing its power and relevancy.

Because during the time I grew up with, between 1994-2014, PSDB was practically inevitable as the “main” center-right party. Dilma’s impeachment and all the 2015-2018 hysteria to bring down the left - joined by the media - was all done with the idea that PSDB would finally win presidency back in 2018 after four consecutive defeats.

Media and the elites didn’t expect Bolsonaro’s win at all! They wanted PSDB. But after he won 1st round, they kinda had to go along with him because he became the only alternative to PT.

And that’s how Bolsonarism hard conservativism unseated neoliberal PSDB as THE “right-wing” force, it wasn’t something predictable or expected at all. It’s much easier to attribute it as such in retrospect because we’ve already seen it been played out.

[Red Velvet]

Macri winning did not blow up the system.

No, but it worked as a non-Peronist alternative that has already been tried and effectively didn’t work or was disliked, opening doors for other “Non-Peronist” alternatives.

Peronists would never be winning this election, they’re vying for a respectable 2nd place.

[Red Velvet]

Again, you're trying to compare Brazilian and Argentinean politics and that's wrong. Brazil never had anything similar to Peronism that makes the left-right axis irrelevant.

Political polarization doesn’t need to be left vs right in order to effectively exist. And it’s showing signs it does clearly exist in Argentina, the strong party system at most represses it but not necessarily limits it or stops it.

If Milei ends up in 1st; Massa 2nd, you won’t be able to say Milei votes didn’t come mostly from people who are more sympathetic towards JxC than they are to Peronists. This is THEIR “election” after all. Even if Milei has a broad overperformance regardless of region.

[Red Velvet]

Again, you're trying to compare Brazilian and Argentinean politics and that's wrong. Brazil never had anything similar to Peronism that makes the left-right axis irrelevant.

Political polarization doesn’t need to be left vs right in order to effectively exist. And it’s showing signs it does clearly exist in Argentina, the strong party system at most represses it but not necessarily limits it or stops it.

I was talking about clientelism, do you live in Sweden?

Well then in that case that’s a big prejudice and misconception of yours about Brazil itself, to think that the shift from PSDB to Bolsonaro easily happened because of buying of votes (??) instead of the people’s actual will.

You didn’t live here between 2015-2018. As much as I hate Bolsonaro, I can fully say that people (filled with anti-PT hate and propaganda for four years straight) WANTED him because they wanted a radical change and break with the system.

Also, if you recognized before that Bolsonaro didn’t have partisan backing, then where the hell he got money to pay for votes?? Lmao. His campaign didn’t have any money in 2018, he was a nobody then. It was a full grassroots movement.

2022 is a different story, as he had the government machine on his side as president. But since we’re talking about 2018, what you’re saying makes absolutely zero sense.

In terms of political behaviors and culture, Argentina might actually be the closest country there is in the entire world to Brazil.

[Red Velvet]

Again, you're trying to compare Brazilian and Argentinean politics and that's wrong. Brazil never had anything similar to Peronism that makes the left-right axis irrelevant.

Political polarization doesn’t need to be left vs right in order to effectively exist. And it’s showing signs it does clearly exist in Argentina, the strong party system at most represses it but not necessarily limits it or stops it.

I was talking about clientelism, do you live in Sweden?

Well then in that case that’s a big prejudice and misconception of yours about Brazil itself, to think that the shift from PSDB to Bolsonaro easily happened because of buying of votes (??) instead of the people’s actual will.

You didn’t live here between 2015-2018. As much as I hate Bolsonaro, I can fully say that people (filled with anti-PT hate and propaganda for four years straight) WANTED him because they wanted a radical change and break with the system.

Also, if you recognized before that Bolsonaro didn’t have partisan backing, then where the hell he got money to pay for votes?? Lmao. His campaign didn’t have any money in 2018, he was a nobody then. It was a full grassroots movement.

2022 is a different story, as he had the government machine on his side as president. But since we’re talking about 2018, what you’re saying makes absolutely zero sense.

In terms of political behaviors and culture, Argentina might actually be the closest country there is in the entire world to Brazil.

I think that you misunderstood me 100%, what I was trying to say is that I thought (maybe until today) that political machines in Argentina (Peronism) were more powerful than yours and therefore Brazil was a "healthier" democracy.

I think that’s more of a myth tbh, coming from the fact that Peronism can take any shape from right (90s) or left (00s onwards).

Nowadays, Peronism is firmly associated with the left and since it presents more “left” options that naturally opens doors for alternatives to rise.

I mean, if the current government is disliked and there isn’t opposition to them other than outside peronism, then it’s kind of a given that these forces will rise? People define political forces much more than political forces define them. I mean, at least outside USA, that’s a place where I would be shook to see an outsider from the two big parties win, there you need to co-opt one of the parties to your side.

But in Argentina isn’t much of a surprise at all to me, under the current context. I even see signs of what I saw later emerging in Brazil 2022, with CABA being heavily the biggest JxC stronghold now, while Milei and Peronism dominate regions in the interior.

It’s exactly what you would expect from the “Populist Right”, it’s usually way more popular outside the big cities. São Paulo city, for instance, was always a PSDB friendly city in comparison to others. Once PSDB collapsed, it became way more undefined, going for Bolsonaro in 2018 (year the left was very unpopular) and for Lula in 2022 (year the right was more unpopular).

If 2nd round is Bullrich vs Milei, CABA will probably go Bullrich and be one of the “leftist” in the country.

If 2nd round is Massa vs Milei, CABA will overwhelmingly go Milei and be one of the more “right-wing” ones otoh, as peronism has more strength in the interior areas.

And in the scenario where it’s Massa vs Milei and Milei wins and does and awful Bolsonaro-like government, attacking all human rights possible while economy stays bad, don’t doubt the possibility of CABA in 2027 becoming way more “Peronist-friendly” in comparison to other parts of the country either, where Milei will retain his force no matter what he says.

In Brazil, the “left-wing shift” from 2022 came exactly from the big cities in the South and Southeast, which were extremely in favor of Bolsonaro in 2022. The close association to those in Argentina is CABA.

[Red Velvet]

Friendly reminder that in 2019 turnout between the primaries and the general election went up by 5% and the results changed from Fernandez defeating Macri by 16 points to Fernandez defeating Macri by 8 points.

Despite what some people in this thread said about Milei winning not being a shock, it certainly was and this means that there is a strong probability that turnout will increase in 2 months and then all bets are off. What will happen? I have no f**king idea

Yes, on a serious note before I spam this thread with Milei memes it’s important to note that the PASO in Argentina does not have a great record at predicting the later election results, and in fact being at 32% does not put you close to victory (although Milei+Bullrich being over 50% is still a very strong outcome for hard-fisconism; Milei himself is a literal anarchocapitalist and Rothbard fanatic and lots of room exists to his left).

(But, for American readers, this would be like someone from the Mises Caucus of the LP surging ahead of both the GOP and the Democrats in, like, a 2-year period. It’s a deeply bizarre phenomenon and while it’s being lumped in with things like Trump/Bolsonaro/Vox and so on Milei is multiple orders of magnitude more extreme than any of those things.)

It’s the exact same cult of personality from Trump/Bolsonaro regardless. The aggressive way he communicates is way more compelling than any agenda he defends. The anger in middle of a bad situation is what drives his support for people to connect.

Don’t forget Milei candidates flopped hard in their elections just this year. It’s much more about HIM as a personality than any ideological group he represents. Like Bolsonaro also was.

Though you’re right that when you look at the details, he represents something different of his own but that’s not something new. Trump and Bolsonaro themselves were already different from each other in the details, Trump being an expression of Social Conservatism - deeply related to new cultural wars - and Bolsonaro being the same old skeleton of military dictatorship era conservatism that pushes for “order” and safety.

Milei definitely has a more radical conservative leaning than those two in the economic sense as a Libertarian, while using other elements related to cultural wars more as a tool than necessarily a goal. At least that’s the impression at a first glance, who knows what his actual government would be like.

[Red Velvet]

It goes in line with what people were the angriest about tbh.

USA - Social Progressivism and growing racial equality. Reaction: To put a guy that represents the White Panic of a continuously less white US and promises to block immigration from lesser white countries and reverse it.

Brazil - Corruption. Reaction: To put a guy that’s associated to the Military, which is incorrectly associated to “order”, promising to put order in the house and using a brand of “punitive law” in his favor.

Argentina - Economic Chaos and Degradation. Reaction: To put a Libertarian who promises to bring a larger economic break with the current system than Margaret Thatcher ever did in UK.

It’s how the right “brand” in US is bound to have a much longer life than in Brazil, for example. The White Fear there is something very real and ongoing, bound to keep existing as the US white population keeps decreasing in share. Trump and figures built on his image will inevitably keep coming back.

In Brazil, systematic corruption still exists obviously but it’s something harsher for Bolsonarists to use as a political toll as police investigations put out continuous evidence of more and more scandals for their representative to face. And everything for his self-gain, which harms their “brand” on the long term much more as they cannot pass themselves as something “different” anymore.

Not saying the right can’t have a revival here in Brazil, but they would necessarily need a change of brand that isn’t mostly associated to anti-corruption because that simply doesn’t stick anymore. The right may not be dead at all, but Bolsonaro is.

In Argentina otoh, the longevity of it really depends on what kind of answer Milei gives to Argentina’s economic problems that last for multiple decades now and are quite structural. And whether they will have a showing positive effect to the population in 4 years time.

I can honestly see him being ejected like scum from politics in 2027 to him becoming the mainstream face of a lasting political movement depending how it goes. We’ll see.

[Red Velvet]

If read that Milei wants to eliminate the Argentinian central bank and instead use the US dollar as currency. Hasn't that been done before with disastrous results. I remember visiting Argentina when they had their peso pegged for many years at parity to the US dollar (which is essentially the same thing as using the US dollar as currency) and it was seen as a total policy failure that had to be abandoned

Yup, but I don’t think Argentinians really care, they’re lost and extremely desperate and Milei looks like the only guy giving them a different solution from everything.

It’s an emotional protest vote, not supposed to be something rational. More of a rejection of all the other options. And like I said, they have much better reasons than Brazilians in 2018, so no wonder this guy is way more of an extremist, on the economic sense.

Brazilians on twitter were shook with the video of this guy saying he would end even the health and education ministries in Argentina: “Wow, he’s much crazier than Bolsonaro ever was” is the general impression.

Stuff like full privatization of health and education systems, alongside favoring stuff like selling of organs, would make him a full weirdo in Brazilian politics, even with Bolsonaro running at his side.

But that’s expected considering Bolsonaro was mostly a Social Conservative only using Economic Conservatism to sustain a wide base. Milei otoh is a full Ancap, mostly an Economic Conservative who just uses Social Conservativism to sustain his base.

Interesting to watch how much he will be able to do without limited by congress though, if he doesn’t have a working majority. Bolsonaro basically gave up governing here because it was too hard and he was lazy (the fragmented system has its upsides when crazy people take over!) and basically delegated all power to the “Big Center”.

Milei could follow a somewhat similar path, at least let’s hope so for Argentina’s sake. For all the comparisons foreign people made between Bolsonaro and Pinochet back at the time, Bolsonaro was never an economic hardline neoliberal, he always resembled more Brazil’s own military dictatorship leaders, who were intrinsically way more of developmentalists than whatever insanity you saw from Chile.

But Milei, he reminds me much more of the Chilean guy, especially on the economical sense. He also always looks way angrier in a way that makes Bolsonaro look calm and friendly lol

[Red Velvet]

I realize that there's little point asking why anything is done in Argentina, easily the most risible country on the planet, but what exactly is the purpose of this 'primary' election? Is it just to waste more money? This seems plausible as doing so is Argentina's other national sport along with football, but there must be an official point as well?

Same point of the US primaries, but way simpler and realized nationally in just one day: To define the candidate who will run for each ticket.

For parties like LLA, it doesn’t matter because they have only one candidate, which is Milei. For them it works more only as a “test”, like a giant national poll. But for the others, you have defined that Massa will be the UP candidate as the top voter getter from them. And at the JxC, Bullrich will be the candidate as she got more votes in the primary than Larreta.

Not sure why it sounds that crazy, to me it makes a lot more sense than US primaries that happen separately by party and at different states at different times. That’s way more of a waste of money and time to me, if you’re going to have primaries, the best way to do it is how Argentina does it.

[Red Velvet]

Btw, the Central Bank decided that just after the elections was the right moment to massively devalue the peso's official value by going from 285 to 345-365 per dollar, unsurprisingly with this and the unexpected election results the black market exchange rate (dólar blue) made a similar jump from 600 to 700

Thanks Massa

Lmao as if the Argentinian government had any control over the dollar, especially at this point. If they did, they wouldn’t let it grow exponentially until today.

Maybe, just maybe, the market is scared about crazy ancap guy because it represents ANOTHER drastic shift in policy direction and possibly more instability?

Argies Peronist derangement syndrome is hilarious in the way it’s fully copy+paste from Anti-PT feelings here between 2015-2020 and even if a dog made poo on their sidewalk, it was somehow PT’s fault.

Not that the Argentinian government isn’t incompetent, but it’s funny/sad how people are at a point where they blame everything on them. I wonder what will be like if Milei flops hard in government, where you guys will run to.

The peronists will probably come back and once they flop again you will need a new weird anti-establishment savior.

[Red Velvet]

Btw, the Central Bank decided that just after the elections was the right moment to massively devalue the peso's official value by going from 285 to 345-365 per dollar, unsurprisingly with this and the unexpected election results the black market exchange rate (dólar blue) made a similar jump from 600 to 700

Thanks Massa

Lmao as if the Argentinian government had any control over the dollar, especially at this point. If they did, they wouldn’t let it grow exponentially until today.

Maybe, just maybe, the market is scared about crazy ancap guy because it represents ANOTHER drastic shift in policy direction and possibly more instability?

Argies Peronist derangement syndrome is hilarious in the way it’s fully copy+paste from Anti-PT feelings here between 2015-2020 and even if a dog made poo on their sidewalk, it was somehow PT’s fault.

Not that the Argentinian government isn’t incompetent, but it’s funny/sad how people are at a point where they blame everything on them. I wonder what will be like if Milei flops hard in government, where you guys will run to.

The peronists will probably come back and once they flop again you will need a new weird anti-establishment savior.

I beseech you not to negatively polarize yourself into becoming a Peronist.

Not a peronist, but the way people here are normalizing the crazy ancap guy who already supported the selling of children as if they were a commodity because “Peronists are responsible for all evil in Argentina or something” is extremely dangerous. Still expected for here though.

[Red Velvet]

Looking at things a couplke of days later, it would seem that Milei did this well in great part by solidly winning provinces that were not Buenos Aires and by taking huge chunks of votes from kirchnerist strongholds in the metropolitan area. Just look at the votes in the metro area, comparing them to the 2019 primaries, JxC did 2 points better in 2023 while UxP did 18 points worse!. CABA oligarchs like Lexii and myself usually vote for JxC and random communists lol

Yeah, contrary to what certain delusional Third Worldists in this thread seem to be implying, Milei was very much not the candidate of the filthy anti-Peronist elite…

Wrong impression of yours, I’m referring to the Argentinians here not freaking out about Milei being possibly their next president.

It’s like an older experienced brother watch the younger one about to get f***** up while they don’t even know it yet and right now are all happy or hopeful and all you can do is nothing but watch them commit the same mistakes of yours.

And at the same time, you know they have to go through that experience to truly know it like we did, so it’s a weird paradox mix of resignation with desperation for them all going on simultaneously.

[Red Velvet]

This morning I heard someone talking about these elections in Argentina and the words that came to my mind were "collective failure". Certainly peronistas and macristas are a bunch of incompetent idiots, but look at that clown Milei. Trump and Bolsonaro look like respectable statesmen in comparison. I remember that years ago I found politics in Argentina entertaining, but the current levels of vulgarity are too high and this is truly painful to watch

The eternal cycle continues: the left always think today's right-wing leader is worse than yesterday's right wing leader. Really a bold statement for someone who has called Trump, Bolsonaro, and Vox fascists to say Milei makes them look like respectable statesmen.

Not sure about Vox leaders, but he’s definitely way more unstable than Trump or Bolsonaro ever were. Even if it’s mostly a “theatrical performance” on his part in order to get attention and media. It’s like a much tackier Bolsonaro, who already happened to be a tackier Trump.

I would easily support Bolsonaro on a hypothetical 2nd round of Milei vs Bolsonaro, simply for thinking he presents less risks because he looks more normal and healthy than this guy:



Right now, I would vote for Bullrich since this is an election the Peronists aren’t winning and a Massa vs Milei 2nd round would be an inevitable disaster. But maybe JxC can defeat Milei in 2nd round.

The dream scenario however is that since all three political forces are so close to each other, all between 27%-30%, would be a Bullrich and Massa minimal surge ahead of Milei after his support wanes since there are some Argentinians now waking up to the extremely dangerous possibility of him becoming their president.

But I’m skeptical of this. Considering their economic situation and anger, I think it’s way more likely these primary results gets more people comfortable to support him instead of being scared away because a PASO victory normalizes his figure.

[Red Velvet]

Wrong impression of yours, I’m referring to the Argentinians here not freaking out about Milei being possibly their next president.

Anything (even having a Libertarian as President) would be better than the criminals currently running the country.

I heard the same thing in 2018 on a constant level, just replace the libertarian with military guy in your sentence.

No matter what bad situation you’re in, there’s ALWAYS the scenario of things getting worse.

But again, sometimes you have to live it in order to truly know it in your heart and get it out of your system, then so be it. Electing someone ineffective you dislike from UP or JxC could be just delaying some even worse reaction in the future after all.

My hope for you is that a Milei presidency suffers as much opposition as the Bolsonaro one did and is limited a lot by what congress allows him to do, making him more of a decorative entertainment clown figure and the long-term more destructive stuff isn’t passed.

It will be tough 4 years but you will survive. Everything will be okay.

[Red Velvet]

My hope for you is that a Milei presidency suffers as much opposition as the Bolsonaro one did and is limited a lot by what congress allows him to do, making him more of a decorative entertainment clown figure and the long-term more destructive stuff isn’t passed.

It will be tough 4 years but you will survive. Everything will be okay.

Dude, he's from Uruguay, spare him the sermon lol

It’s literally the same thing!