Patricia Bullrich, presidential candidate for opposition coalition Juntos por el Cambio (JxC), presented her running mate Luis Petri, a former Mendoza national deputy, and announced further details of the senators and deputies on her ballot at a press conference on Friday. 

In Buenos Aires city, former classical dancer Maximiliano Guerra will top the deputy ballot, while national deputy Cristian Ritondo of PRO, one of JxC’s main parties, will top the list for Buenos Aires province. Buenos Aires province local deputy Maximiliano Abad, who was in the mix to be Bullrich’s running mate before Petri was confirmed, will top the Buenos Aires province senator ballot. 

“Changing Argentina is a very important challenge,” said Bullrich during the presentation. “We all know this [presidential] ticket and the team surrounding it is a group that will give it its best for the people and for change, but not just any change, not one that will only go half way or be lukewarm. It will be a consistent change.”   

Bullrich will compete in the upcoming Juntos por el Cambio (JxC) primaries on August 13 against fellow PRO member Horacio Rodríguez Larreta and Facundo Manes of the Radical Civic Union (UCR) party, the other major party in JxC, for the coalition’s presidential nomination. 

While the PRO candidate had already announced Petri as her running mate in a video published on social media on Thursday, the presentation was also meant as a formal introduction to the presidential ticket.

Who is Luis Petri?

Petri and Bullrich have similar views on security: the former Mendoza deputy and UCR member was one of the authors of the “Chocobar bill”, a 2020 initiative that sought to change Article 34 of the Penal Code to establish “a legal presumption of duty fulfillment” for police officers who “defend a victim’s life, physical integrity, freedom or property” while intervening in a criminal act while off duty.

The project was created after police officer Luis Chocobar was convicted of murder for killing a teenage boy who had stabbed a tourist he was mugging in the Buenos Aires neighborhood of La Boca. Petri intended to change the Penal Code so that officers in similar situations would not face legal consequences.

Petri is part of a UCR leaders group called the “Malbec Group”, which is aligned with the more tough-on-crime PRO faction led by Bullrich. They have differences with coalition members like Buenos Aires Mayor Horacio Rodríguez Larreta and Senator Martín Lousteau, who are not hard-liners in this area.