Security Minister Patricia Bullrich has replaced Security Secretary Vicente Ventura Barreiro with Alejandra Monteoliva. She announced Saturday that she had asked Ventura to resign after he allegedly attempted to interfere in a tender for food services for federal prisons.

“With great bravery, [Monteoliva] is joining [us] to continue the fight against narcoterrorism, criminal organizations, and to ensure the rule of law and order,” Bullrich wrote on X Sunday evening. “Alejandra is the right person for this historic time of paradigm change in security, which it is our job to confront.”

Monteoliva was Security Minister for Córdoba province during Juan Schiaretti’s governorship. She also served as national director of the Criminal Information Management unit and head of the Federal Forces Special Operations division. 

“With proven experience as a security consultant in countries like Honduras and El Salvador, where she worked on the successful ‘Bukele Model;’ and in management, both in Colombia and in our country, where she accompanied me in my last term as security minister, she will have the enormous responsibility of collaborating on Argentina’s security,” Bullrich added.

Bullrich said she had reported Ventura to Argentina’s anti-corruption offices after he allegedly meddled in a tender for federal prison food services that had been expanded to include 300 companies, rather than the 15 who competed for the contract in previous rounds. The move came as a surprise against a man widely considered her number two. “This government has taken a commitment to transparency in its administration,” she wrote.

Critics have suggested that Ventura’s ouster was motivated by internal disputes in Bullrich’s right-wing Republican Proposal (PRO) party, something she has denied. Bullrich has been jockeying for control over the party with former President Mauricio Macri. Ventura is close to Macri loyalist, Cristián Ritondo. The party has been seeking to define itself politically with regard to libertarian ruling coalition, La Libertad Avanza.

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El Salvador’s President Nayib Bukele built his popularity by reducing the country’s once soaring homicide rate to historic lows. This success has come at the cost of eroding civil rights, with tens of thousands imprisoned under a “state of emergency” provision passed in March 2022 that has allowed the state to arrest and try suspected gang members without due process. There have been accusations of massive human rights violations, from forced disappearances and torture to prison overcrowding.

Bullrich and President Javier Milei have expressed admiration for Bukele’s approach, and explicitly seek to copy the model in Argentina. Bullrich traveled to El Salvador from June 16-19, where she met with Bukele and other top government officials. She and Salvadoran Justice and Security Minister Gustavo Villatoro signed an agreement to develop an inter-state working model on preventing and tackling transnational organized crime.