BUENOS AIRES, Argentina: Argentina’s libertarian President Javier Milei won decisive victories in key districts in midterm elections Sunday, clinching a crucial vote of confidence that strengthens his ability to carry out his radical free-market experiment with billions of dollars in backing from the Trump administration.
Milei’s governing La Libertad Avanza party won over 40 percent of votes in national elections to renew almost half of the lower house of Congress, according to tallies in local media using numbers from electoral authorities with more than 97 percent of votes counted.
La Libertad Avanza also swept six of the eight provinces in the vote to renew a third of the Senate. The figures exceeded analysts’ projections for Sunday’s vote.
In comparison, the results showed the left-leaning populist opposition movement, known as Peronism, winning over 31 percent of the vote — what analysts described as the alliance’s poorest performance in years.
Milei said his party went from holding just 37 seats in the lower house of Congress to 101 after Sunday’s vote. In the Senate, he said La Libertad Avanza picked up 14 more seats to end up with 20 senators. The strong showing ensures Milei will have enough support in Congress to uphold presidential vetoes, prevent an impeachment effort and see through his ambitious plans for tax and labor reforms in the coming months.
At his party headquarters in downtown Buenos Aires, Milei burst onstage and sang a few lines of the death-metal tune that has become his anthem in a raspy baritone: “I am the king of a lost world!”
Beaming as his supporters cheered, he seized on the results as evidence of that Argentina had turned the page on decades of Peronism that brought the country infamy for repeatedly defaulting on its sovereign debt.
“The Argentine people left decadence behind and opted for progress,” Milei said, thanking “all those who supported the ideas of freedom to make Argentina great again.”
Perhaps never has an Argentine legislative election generated so much interest in Washington and Wall Street, particularly after US President Donald Trump indicated that he could rescind $20 billion in financial assistance to his close ally in cash-strapped Argentina if Milei lost Sunday’s vote.
But the buzz around the election abroad wasn’t felt in Argentina. Even though voting is compulsory, electoral authorities reported a turnout rate of just under 68 percent Sunday, among the lowest recorded since the nation’s 1983 return to democracy.
Milei, a key ideological ally of Trump who has slashed state spending and liberalized Argentina’s economy after decades of budget deficits and protectionism, had a lot riding on Sunday’s elections.
Milei’s government has been scrambling to avert a currency crisis ever since a major defeat by the Peronist opposition in a provincial election last month panicked markets and prompted a selloff in the peso that led to the US Treasury’s extraordinary intervention.
A series of scandals — including bribery allegations against Milei’s powerful sister, Karina Milei — hurt the president’s image as an anti-corruption crusader and hit a nerve among voters reeling from his harsh austerity measures.
Although the budget cuts have significantly driven down inflation, from an annual high of 289 percent in April 2024 to just 32 percent last month, many Argentines are still struggling to make ends meet.
Price rises have outpaced salaries and pensions since Milei cut cost-of-living increases. Households pay more for electricity and public transport since Milei cut subsidies. The unemployment rate is now higher than when the libertarian president took office.
Milei triumphs in Argentine midterm elections closely watched by Washington
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Milei triumphs in Argentine midterm elections closely watched by Washington
- Milei’s governing La Libertad Avanza party won over 40 percent of votes
Ethiopia’s prime minister accuses Eritrea of mass killings during Tigray war
- Landlocked Ethiopia says that Eritrea is arming rebel groups, while Eritrea says Ethiopia’s aspiration is to gain access to a seaport
- Ethiopia lost sovereign access to the Red Sea when Eritrea seceded in 1993 after decades of guerrilla warfare
ADDIS ABABA: Ethiopia’s government Tuesday for the first time acknowledged the involvement of troops from neighboring Eritrea in the war in the Tigray region that ended in 2022, accusing them of mass killings, amid reports of renewed fighting in the region.
Ethiopian Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed, while addressing parliament Tuesday, accused Eritrean troops fighting alongside Ethiopian forces of mass killings in the war, during which more than 400,000 people are estimated to have died.
Eritrean and Ethiopian troops fought against regional forces in the northern Tigray region in a war that ended in 2022 with the signing of a peace agreement.
Eritrea’s Information Minister Yemane Gebremeskel told The Associated Press that Ahmed’s comments were “cheap and despicable lies” and did not merit a response.
Both nations have been accusing each other of provoking a potential civil war, with landlocked Ethiopia saying that Eritrea is arming and funding rebel groups, while Eritrea says Ethiopia’s aspiration is to gain access to a seaport.
“The rift did not begin with the Red Sea issue, as many people think,” Ahmed told parliamentarians. “It started in the first round of the war in Tigray, when the Eritrean army followed us into Shire and began demolishing houses, massacred our youth in Axum, looted factories in Adwa, and uprooted our factories.”
“The Red Sea and Ethiopia cannot remain separated forever,” he added.
Ethiopia lost sovereign access to the Red Sea when Eritrea seceded in 1993 after decades of guerrilla warfare.
Gebremeskel said the prime minister has only recently changed his tune in his push for access to the Red Sea.
Ahmed “and his top military brass were profusely showering praises and State Medals on the Eritrea army and its senior officers. … But when he later developed the delusional malaise of ‘sovereignty access to the sea’ and an agenda of war against Eritrea, he began to sing to a different chorus,” he said.
Eritrea and Ethiopia initially made peace after Abiy came to power in 2018, with Abiy winning a Nobel Peace Prize for his efforts toward reconciliation.
In June, Eritrea accused Ethiopia of having a “long-brewing war agenda” aimed at seizing its Red Sea ports. Ethiopia recently said that Eritrea was “actively preparing to wage war against it.”
Analysts say an alliance between Eritrea and regional forces in the troubled Tigray region may be forming, as fighting has been reported in recent weeks. Flights by the national carrier to the region were canceled last week over the renewed clashes.
