{"id":40028,"date":"2025-10-27T09:32:26","date_gmt":"2025-10-27T09:32:26","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/news.godj.com\/news\/javier-milei-and-his-chainsaw-austerity-win-big\/"},"modified":"2025-10-27T09:32:26","modified_gmt":"2025-10-27T09:32:26","slug":"javier-milei-and-his-chainsaw-austerity-win-big","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/news.godj.com\/news\/javier-milei-and-his-chainsaw-austerity-win-big\/","title":{"rendered":"Javier Milei and his ‘chainsaw’ austerity win big"},"content":{"rendered":"


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Ione Wells<\/span>South America correspondent<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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\"GettyGetty Images<\/span><\/div>\n<\/div>\n

Javier Milei won nearly 41% of the vote in Argentina’s midterm elections<\/figcaption><\/p>\n<\/figure>\n
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Argentina’s president Javier Milei has led his party to a landslide victory in Sunday’s midterm elections, after defining the first two years of his presidency with radical spending cuts and free-market reforms.<\/p>\n

His party, La Libertad Avanza, won nearly 41% of the vote, taking 13 of 24 Senate seats and 64 of the 127 lower-house seats that were contested.<\/p>\n

His gains will make it easier for Milei to push ahead with his programme to slash state spending and deregulate the economy.<\/p>\n

President Donald Trump congratulated Milei on social media, saying: “He’s making us all look good.” Before the vote, Trump made it clear<\/a> a $40bn US lifeline for Argentina would depend on Milei keeping political momentum.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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Milei’s supporters welcomed that, though critics accused Trump of foreign interference in Argentina’s elections.<\/p>\n

In a nod to his North American ally, Milei told cheering supporters: “We must consolidate the path of reform we have embarked upon to turn Argentina’s history around once and for all\u2026 to make Argentina great again.”<\/p>\n

Before these elections his party had just seven Senate seats and 37 seats in the lower house.<\/p>\n

That meant his programme of spending cuts and reforms faced various political obstacles.<\/p>\n

His vetoes of bills to boost funding for state universities, people with disabilities and children’s healthcare were all overturned by opposition lawmakers.<\/p>\n

After Sunday’s result, hundreds of his supporters gathered, cheering, outside a hotel in Buenos Aires where he was watching the result.<\/p>\n

“Milei didn’t have 15% of Congress in his favour. Now, with many more deputies and senators, he’ll be able to change the country in a year,” one young voter Dionisio said.<\/p>\n

“Our province was devastated by previous governments,” another voter Ezequiel said.<\/p>\n

“Now, thank God, freedom has won. We want our daughter to grow up in this beautiful country. What happened in previous years is regrettable.”<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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\"GettyGetty Images<\/span><\/div>\n<\/div>\n

Hundreds of Milei’s supporters gathered in the streets to celebrate the election result<\/figcaption><\/p>\n<\/figure>\n
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These elections were the first national test of President Milei’s popularity since he took office in 2023, pledging to shrink state spending by taking a metaphorical “chainsaw” to it. He brandished a real one during his campaign rallies.<\/p>\n

He’s since cut budgets for education, pensions, health, infrastructure, and subsidies, and laid off tens of thousands of public sector workers.<\/p>\n

Supporters, including Trump, hail him for taming inflation – which hit triple figures annually before he took office – cutting the deficit, and restoring investor confidence.<\/p>\n

His critics, though, argue the price has been job losses, a decline in manufacturing, crumbling public services, a fall in people’s purchasing power and an imminent recession.<\/p>\n

Juliana, who works with children with disabilities in Tucum\u00e1n province, is concerned that a law to increase funding for people with disabilities – which Milei vetoed, before being overturned – could be “in danger” with the president’s position strengthened in Congress.<\/p>\n

“Our salaries are low, it remains the same, while other things are increasing. We still don’t see a change,” she added.<\/p>\n

Veronica, a retired police officer, has been hit by Milei’s pension cuts.<\/p>\n

“You see a lot of poverty,” she said. “It’s very hard: for retirees, for people with children with disabilities, for young people. There’s a lot of unemployment. Many factories have closed.”<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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Juliana (L) and Veronica (R) are concerned about possible spending cuts <\/figcaption><\/p>\n<\/figure>\n
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Milei has also kept inflation down by propping up the peso, leaving it overvalued and draining reserves ahead of $20bn of debt repayments next year.<\/p>\n

This had caused alarm that Argentina could be hurtling towards an economic crisis.<\/p>\n

That, coupled with a poor election result in Buenos Aires province in September, spooked the financial markets that Milei’s cost-cutting agenda may not be politically sustainable.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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These factors prompted the US to step in to help. It has now offered Argentina a potential $40bn lifeline via the combination of a currency swap, buying pesos and arranging private investment.<\/p>\n

“If he wins, we’re staying with him. If he doesn’t win, we’re gone,” Trump had threatened.<\/p>\n

Before this election, doubts had grown about Milei’s political future due to some voters tiring of his austerity programme, as well as a series of corruption scandals that had rocked his party.<\/p>\n

This election turnout was 67.9%, the lowest in a national election in decades, representing widespread apathy with politicians of all stripes.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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Some voters backed him reluctantly.<\/p>\n

“Milei has two years left and should try to do what he can,” said Dardo, a business owner in Buenos Aires. “I think we’re on the right path, but the middle and working classes are suffering too much.”<\/p>\n

He is sceptical the support from the US will help, saying “we’re going to have to pay for it at some point”.<\/p>\n

Others, like political science student Thiago, said they understood the need for fiscal balance but questioned Milei’s means.<\/p>\n

“There’s a lack of investment in hospitals, infrastructure, in people with disabilities,” he said. “There’s a certain false hope.”<\/p>\n

This election result, though, shows that many Argentines remain unwilling to return to the Peronist model Milei blames for decades of economic mismanagement. <\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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\"GettyGetty Images<\/span><\/div>\n<\/div>\n

Milei’s took office in 2023 with a pledge to shrink state spending by taking a metaphorical “chainsaw” to it<\/figcaption><\/p>\n<\/figure>\n
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“Argentines showed that they do not want to return to the failed model, the model of inflation\u2026 the model of a useless state,” he declared.<\/p>\n

Financial markets are expected to rally after the win: a sign that, for now, Milei’s political survival has also kept his economic experiment alive – and US support in place.<\/p>\n

His new mandate gives him the power to implement more radical changes ahead of the next presidential election in 2027, when his name could be on the ballot once more.<\/p>\n

The question now is whether ordinary voters start feeling better off, or if the pain of some of his cuts tests people’s patience once more.<\/p>\n

For now, it appears a significant proportion of voters are \u2013 once again \u2013 prepared to give him time.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n


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Ione WellsSouth America correspondent Getty Images Javier Milei won nearly 41% of the vote in Argentina’s midterm elections Argentina’s president Javier Milei has led his party to a landslide victory in Sunday’s midterm elections, after defining the first two years of his presidency with radical spending cuts and free-market reforms. His party, La Libertad Avanza, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":40029,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[43],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-40028","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-latin-america"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.godj.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/40028","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.godj.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.godj.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.godj.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.godj.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=40028"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/news.godj.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/40028\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":40030,"href":"https:\/\/news.godj.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/40028\/revisions\/40030"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.godj.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/40029"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.godj.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=40028"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.godj.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=40028"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.godj.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=40028"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}