If you’re not Argentine and, whether for professional reasons or personal interest, you’re trying to understand what happened in the midterm parliamentary election on Sunday, October 26, this might help you.
If you have any comments, questions, or criticisms, they’re welcome—feel free to leave them below, and I’ll almost certainly respond.
- Some cranks go so far as to believe there was fraud, since, according to them, it’s impossible for a 13-point lead to have been overturned in the Buenos Aires Province election. They are anti-Milei cranks now; when the results went against Milei, pro-Milei cranks appeared, arguing exactly the same thing. The Argentine electoral system is reliable: no serious person disputes it. Let’s remember that in the 2023 presidential general election, Sergio Massa (a Peronist-Kirchnerist) came in first with 37% and was just 3 points away from governing Argentina… in a country with 143% year-over-year inflation. At that time, anti-Peronists claimed that Peronism had committed fraud. There was no fraud in 2023, there was no fraud this time, and there was no fraud in September.
- La Libertad Avanza does not hold the sum of public power: It is the ONLY truly national political party in Argentina. This is a credit to President Milei’s personal brand: it is primarily because he has a personal brand with national impact that he has a party. This party was not created in accordance with the best practices offered by modern political strategy; it is far from it. But between 2023 and 2024, it was established in every province, and for now, that has been enough.
- Peronism-Kirchnerism (Fuerza Patria) is NOT a national political party today; it is a post-“Albertist” electoral cooperative (that is, one that brings together the remnants of Alberto Fernández’s administration). This was known BEFORE yesterday’s election and was made clear once again. Why? Because Peronism-Kirchnerism today fails—whether under former President Cristina Fernández de Kirchner or Governor Axel Kicillof—to field relevant or competitive parties in every province, or even in every major province. In the country’s second-most-important province, Córdoba, Peronism-Kirchnerism dropped from 10% (in the 2021 parliamentary elections) to 5% this year. Córdoba accounts for nearly 9% of the Argentine electorate: there, a completely autonomous provincial variant of Peronism (known as “cordobesista”) exists.
- Axel Kicillof’s victory in the Province of Buenos Aires in September was primarily due to the self-inflicted damage caused by Javier Milei’s administration. The 13-point margin in favor of his ticket occurred because a very large portion of the pro-Milei electorate was demoralized by the difficult economic situation and the alleged corruption scandals, which is why they did not turn out to vote (the case involving the National Disability Agency and the audio recordings regarding the infamous 3% commission for Milei’s sister, which broke in August).
- President Milei’s victory speech was very astute: while obviously celebratory, it was measured and called on the provincial forces that will be represented in the National Congress to work together toward reforms aimed at “capitalist normalization.” How this process is conducted is crucial. Should President Milei and his team believe they can continue without refining their political governance mechanisms, and should their electorate’s economic conditions fail to improve, they will suffer even greater blows in public opinion than those they faced in 2024, as these will compound with the previous ones. La Libertad Avanza will not get away scot-free with its scandals: the corruption allegations regarding the National Disability Agency or the revelation that a drug trafficker had financed José Luis Espert, a Milei-backed candidate who had to withdraw his candidacy (an action that has had no electoral impact so far). All of this generates what we call “hidden damage.” The current government has been systematically accumulating “hidden damage.” It has already begun to pay the price in public opinion, as its image has plummeted. The most interesting thing is that all this damage has been self-inflicted. It hasn’t paid the price as much in electoral terms (though it has paid a price, as we’ll see later). This speaks as much to problems with political leadership within La Libertad Avanza as it does to the incompetence of the fragmented and lackluster opposition. Nor will Trump’s support for the Argentine economy and politics come without a cost in terms of public opinion, as it does not sit well with the public’s self-esteem.
- The quantitative polls did NOT fail; rather, a portion of the undecided voters swung toward La Libertad Avanza in the final week out of fear of the chaos that might ensue if La Libertad Avanza did not win. Many of them are Milei voters who have become disillusioned with his administration because they see a massive decline in their purchasing power. These undecided voters feared that Argentina would face an economic collapse on the Monday following the election and decided to support the government to preserve the country’s precarious stability, which is sustained thanks to the help of Donald Trump and the U.S. Treasury. For most of the country, the situation is already very overwhelming: anything worse would have been maddening.
- In absolute terms, compared to the 2023 general election, Peronism-Kirchnerism went from 9,200,000 votes to 7,200,000: it lost 2,000,000 votes. In the 2017 and 2021 midterm elections, it had received 7,900,000 votes. In other words, between those parliamentary elections and these, Peronism lost 700,000 votes.
- Milei was expected to absorb the Macrism movement (what remains of former President Mauricio Macri’s political force): in the 2023 general election, the two groups combined (La Libertad Avanza on one side, Juntos por el Cambio on the other) totaled more than 13,000,000 votes. However, in last Sunday’s general election, Milei’s alliance with the Macri camp garnered just over 9,000,000 votes: the combined total of Milei and Macri resulted in 4,000,000 fewer votes. If I were a member of La Libertad Avanza’s leadership team, I would take a closer look at this.
- In the 2023 general election, blank and invalid votes totaled 3,000,000. In last Sunday’s election, they totaled 1,200,000. In other words, there were 1,800,000 fewer blank and invalid votes. Why did this number drop? The number of people who did not vote rose from 8,000,000 to 11,000,000 during the same period. Who are these people? How are they categorized? What do they think? It would be wise to understand them as well.
- From a communications standpoint, at this point, Javier Milei is no longer a new phenomenon: let’s remember that he is a figure who emerged from something as old as television. He was aided by major influencers, but he created almost no original content for social media: contrary to popular belief, his use of TikTok was poor. The problem is that what stands in his way is too outdated: it doesn’t entertain anyone. And without entertainment, there’s no excitement—and therefore no information either. It’s 2025, a year marked by political upheavals where young people organize via Discord to topple governments. The 2027 election in Argentina will be a fruitful one for new political entrepreneurs—if there are any.
