President Javier Milei offered a mix of culture war and domestic politics in his speech at the Buenos Aires meeting of the Madrid Forum, an international right-wing conference that kicked off on Thursday. 

The Argentine president rehashed some of his known talking points, railing against scientists and what he called the “state party.” He also took the opportunity to send a message to the members of his party, La Libertad Avanza (LLA), demanding party discipline after constant infighting has led to a series of scandals that made headlines in Argentine media.

Milei devoted a central part of his speech to bash the “the state party,” an entity he defined as political structures that reject freedom. In that group, he included politicians, businesspeople, unions, social movements, journalists, and even scientists.

“These supposed scientists and intellectuals think that having an academic degree turns them into superior beings and that, therefore, we should all subsidize their vocation,” Mile said. “If you think your investigations are that useful, I invite you to go out to the market, as any average Joe, do your research, publish a book, and see if people are interested or not, instead of hiding cowardly behind the state’s coercive force.”

Milei’s administration has cut funding for scientific research and college education. Media reports say that if Congress passes a bill to increase university funding, Milei will veto it like he vetoed a AR$15,000 (US$15.1 at the official rate, US$11.7 at the MEP rate) monthly raise for pensions.

The president argued that the pension raise would “break economic stability,” and vowed to fight “tooth and nail” against what he called “fiscal degenerates who try to break and destroy society.”

“So do not make a mistake — they don’t give a damn about retirees and public education. They only care about their businesses with politics and the political elite,” he said.

During his presentation, the Argentine president also announced that he would go to Congress to defend the budget for 2025.

“I will soon be going to Congress to explain the basis of the zero deficit to put an end, once and for all, to this cancer that is the fiscal deficit, the fiscal crises, and the macroeconomic disaster that plunged Argentina into poverty,” he said.

LLA infighting in the spotlight

Milei also sent a message to LLA members which is now in the middle of intense infighting. This week, LLA deputies Lilia Lemoine and Marcela Pagano publicly traded barbs, with the latter accusing the former of blackmailing Milei with alleged incriminating videos of him. Last week, deputy Lourdes Arrieta and senator Francisco Paoltroni were expelled from the party.

“The state party, which is another way of referring to the political elite, is organized to ruin the lives of good people, working people. The only way of battling them is through organization and discipline,” Milei said. “That’s why we can’t afford dispersión and inner fights.”

He said that there is no place for “personal ambitions” in LLA. “Any person who doesn’t understand the enormous responsibility of belonging to this party has nothing to do in La Libertad Avanza,” he said.

“God, family, homeland and freedom”

Milei was the keynote speaker of the first day of the Madrid Forum in Buenos Aires, the third regional encounter of this far-right organization after meetings in Colombia and Peru in 2022 and 2023. The event in BA City took place in the Palacio Libertad (Liberty Palace), a cultural center previously known as Centro Cultural Kirchner (CCK) in honor of late President Néstor Kirchner.

The Madrid Forum was created on October 26, 2020, by a think tank of the Spanish political party Vox. It defines itself as an “international alliance that welcomes anyone that defends freedom, democracy, and the rule of law.” One of its stated goals is to “generate awareness regarding the consequences of the advance of the far-left, its ideological agenda, and its failed system of government.” 

Ariel Goldstein, an Argentinian academic who studies Latin America’s far right, explained why it was important for LLA to appear at these events. 

“They gave Milei and [vice president Victoria] Villaruel a place [in 2020] when they were not important politicians in Argentina,” he said, adding that the forum put LLA on the international stage and allowed them to make contact with leaders like Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni.

“The balance seems to have shifted as Milei and Villaruel, having won the presidency, are more important than Vox in Spain. So it is a kind of return of favors,” Goldstein told the Herald.

Many of the speakers shared LLA’s political views. Andrew Olivastro, Chief Advancement Officer for The Heritage Foundation, one of the organizers of the forum, called to “crush the left” in his speech.

“Milei reflects the will of the people, and in Argentina they seem to me to be calling for an opportunity to take a deep breath and live a full life,” Olivastro told the Herald. 

“The solutions from the left have not worked, and are incapable of working. State growth is a problem, the state must be smaller and self-governance, individual choice and individual liberty is fundamentally important. I think that’s where [Milei] aligns in my thinking,” he said.

Present in Argentina for the event are right-wing leaders like Chilean former presidential candidate José Antonio Kast and Spanish deputy Santiago Abascal, from the Vox party.  Also in attendance were supporters of former Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro accused of participating in the January 2023 storming of government buildings. These men and women are currently fugitives from the Brazilian judiciary. 

Fernando Cerimedo, Milei’s Argentine digital guru during his presidential campaign who was accused of disseminating fake news about the Brazilian elections that led to the January 2023 events, was also present. Cerimedo was cheered on when he arrived.

One of the speakers was Brazilian lawyer Tanielli Telles, who represents many of the accused. During her speech, she said that the Bolsonaristas were only arrested for demanding “God, family, homeland and freedom” near the government buildings. Brazilians near her inside the building started to chant those exact words right after she said them.

Credit cover photo: Ignacio Petunchi