Perfil (Sabado)

Milei takes Avanza Libertad into third in City

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Candidates from the Avanza Libertad alliance hailed their party’s results in the PASO primaries this week, which leaves the libertaria­n front with a reasonable claim to be the third-largest political force in Buenos Aires City and Province.

High-profile economists Javier Milei and José Luis Espert ran attention-grabbing campaigns, with the former winning the support of more than 238,000 porteños to finish in a strong third place with 13.66 percent of the vote.

Espert, Avanza Libertad’s candidate for national deputy in Buenos Aires Province, finished fourth in the country’s most-populous region, with 4.87 percent – garnering more than 400,000 votes.

As he celebrated the results at a hotel in the capital on Sunday, Milei described Argentina as a country of “50-50 – 50 percent inflation and 50 percent poor.” Declaring said that the country’s political “caste is afraid,” he told voters that if they truly wanted to remove Kirchneris­m from power, they should back his party.

“I did not come here to lead lambs, I came to wake up lions and the lions are waking up,” declared the candidate for national deputy to cheers from supporters.

“A large part of the people who live in the City accompanie­d us. We are convinced not only that we are going to enter with two [deputies], but also expand,” said the economist, who has made a name for himself on the campaign trail with angry denunciati­ons of mainstream politician­s on both sides of the aisle.

Speaking the following day to Radio Rivadavia, Milei said that he hoped to shave off votes from fellow economist Ricardo López Murphy, who ran to the right of María Eugenia Vidal on the split opposition ticket in the City, in the midterms.

“Twenty-five percent of porteños are aligned with the ideas of freedom,” he claimed. “It is necessary to convince a part [of them] that behind a social democratic structure, the ideas of freedom are not going to be respected, but dominated.”

Stressing that his difference­s with López Murphy are “marginal,” the economist said the most important thing was for “liberalism” to supplant the ruling Peronist coalition as the second-largest force in the capital.” He said pushing Frente de Todos into third “would be a beautiful feat,” though he vowed not to change his passionate and aggressive style on the campaign trail.

Espert, who ran for president in 2019, declared that “liberals are making history again after a long time” away.

“We once again summon the entire centre-right to the task that remains until November 14, when the game will be played seriously,” he declared, looking ahead to the “big task” that awaits in the midterms.

Describing the result as a blow to “corruption, cronyism and accommodat­ion,” the economist said liberalism had grown since 2019 and now had to “aspire to more.”

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