The second round was confirmed in Argentina and will be contested by government leader Sergio Massa, who has 36.20% of the valid votes, against 30.26% for the far-right candidate, Javier Milei.
Argentines will return to the polls on November 19 to decide who will lead the Casa Rosada for the next four years.
Who is Sérgio Massa
The lawyer was born in San Martín, in the province of Buenos Aires, on April 28, 1972, coming from an Italian family, who arrived in the country in the period after the Second World War. He is the current Minister of Economy of Argentina.
- Political life
In a memorable moment in his childhood, his paternal grandfather observed Sergio’s interest in politics and warned him not to follow that path: “Don’t go into politics, politics is dirty”, he reportedly said, according to a memory of the candidate.
Massa’s youth was marked by politics. He remembers that, at age 11, he climbed on top of a bucket and imitated the authorities’ speeches that he saw on television.
During high school, he began to join the Unión del Centro Demático party. In 1994, he interrupted his law studies at the University of Belgrano, which he only completed during the 2013 election campaign, in which he was elected deputy.
In 1999, he was elected provincial deputy. He then held other positions in the Executive and Legislative branches. Between 2002 and 2007, he headed the National Social Security Administration (Anses), responsible for one of the government’s most important budgets.
In 2007, he was elected mayor of Tigre, a city in the province of Buenos Aires. Massa remained in this position until 2013, with a period of leave to serve as Chief of Staff during the Presidency of Cristina Kirchner, between 2008 and 2009, succeeding current President Alberto Fernández.
The politician broke with Kirchnerism in 2013, and began a period in which he positioned himself as a strong opponent of this political force.
At this stage, Massa made severe criticisms of his former allies: “When in 2013 they wanted to impose the ‘eternal Cristina’ on us, we had the courage to stop it. If she reappears, we will stop her again,” she spoke during the campaign in 2017, referring to the current vice president.
In 2019, after a reconciliation, he returned to Peronism as a federal deputy for the province of Buenos Aires and held the presidency of the Chamber of Deputies. In 2022, he became Minister of Economy and is now a candidate for President.
- Economic proposals
After the primaries, the minister-candidate took a series of measures to mitigate the effects of the devaluation of the peso, seeking to contain the deterioration in salaries.
On his initiative, he managed to get Congress to eliminate the fourth category of income tax, which favors sectors at the top of the salary pyramid, but he also made announcements aimed at retirees and informal workers, among others.
During the last presidential debate, Massa promoted new speeches on the economic issue, promising punishment for tax evaders and the creation of a digital currency, without giving further details on the subject.
In the first part of the campaign, he stated that “the biggest solution that Argentina has is to sell what it does to the world and obtain dollars to take the International Monetary Fund [FMI] off your back.”
The concept of getting dollars, paying the IMF and getting it off your “back” is recurrent in Massa’s campaign.
He guarantees that the economic measures he has taken so far are “transitory, but they have to do with the reality of the moment”, which suggests that his decisions in the future could be different.
“Our lithium, our gas, our oil, what the field produces, what the industries produce will be sold more and more to the world, and this will give us the dollars to be free, to be sovereign,” he said.
- Passion for football
Massa is an avowed supporter of Club Atlético Tigre and football in general. He has played as a goalkeeper, although never professionally. He occasionally goes to the stadium, a passion he shares with his son.
But, in addition, there is another point that unites him to the sport: his friendship with former player Juan Román Riquelme. The Boca Juniors idol lived for a long time in the city of Don Torcuato, in the Tigre region, and became close to Massa in his first term as mayor.
Who is Javier Milei
Libertarian Javier Milei (La Libertad Avanza) received the most votes in Argentina’s primary elections in August, with 30.02% of valid votes. The number was well above the 1.5% he needed, as his coalition no longer had any other candidate running.
Despite the surprise in the primaries, Milei’s name did not go unnoticed in the campaign. The economist burst into the media with his “freedom tour” and stood out mainly for his activities outside of politics: his performance as a football player and his time in music with his tribute band to the Rolling Stones are some examples.
- Infancy
Born in the Palermo neighborhood, in Buenos Aires, on October 22, 1970, Milei had a childhood marked by controversial moments in his family, which he himself recognized in a program on the Argentine channel “Telefé”.
Although the relationship with her parents was not good, Milei found support in her sister. The economist recognizes that Karina Milei is the person who knows him best and is “the great architect” of his political events. Milei told different media outlets that if she becomes president, she will play the role of first lady.
The journalist Juan Luis González is one of the researchers of the unauthorized biography of the economist, entitled “El Loco”. A CNN he declared that Javier Milei’s time at Colégio Cardenal Copello, in Villa Devoto, was marked by bullying.
To prepare the book, the author guarantees that he spoke with the presidential candidate’s schoolmates and they all agreed with the memory of a withdrawn and silent boy who was the target of constant jokes.
- Rise in politics
Milei’s rise began in 2018 when he appeared in the main Argentine media, with the dissemination of his “liberal libertarian” speech, as he usually calls it.
The big leap in his political career came in 2020, when he announced his candidacy for President in the 2023 elections.
This step paved the way for his coalition, La Libertad Avanza, to win two seats in the Chamber of Deputies the following year, occupied by him and his vice-presidential candidate, Victoria Villarruel.
His main campaign proposals are the dollarization of the Argentine economy in stages, the reduction of state spending and the privatization of public companies.
On the labor front, he proposes the end of severance pay to reduce labor costs, but two of the proposals that have generated the most controversy are in the security sphere: the deregulation of gun ownership and the militarization of prisons.
- Passion for football
In the 1980s, Milei tried to be a goalkeeper in the youth teams of the Argentine football club Chacarita Juniors. “I’m not a Chacarita fan, but I became part of the professional team in 1989”, confessed the economist in an interview with “Urbana Play FM” radio, in Buenos Aires.
And when it comes to football, another information appears: Milei went from having a box and a star at the Museo de la Pasión Boquense, of Boca Juniors, to a fan in favor of River Plate winning the 2018 Copa Libertadores final, played between the two rivals.
According to him, his passion for the traditional Buenos Aires club cooled with the retirement of striker Martín Palermo, in 2011, and because he disagreed with decisions made by former president Daniel Angelici.
Source: CNN Brasil
Bruce Belcher is a seasoned author with over 5 years of experience in world news. He writes for online news websites and provides in-depth analysis on the world stock market. Bruce is known for his insightful perspectives and commitment to keeping the public informed.
