Jorge Macri, former President Mauricio Macri’s cousin, has been cleared to run for Buenos Aires City Mayor by the city’s electoral court. It ruled against three legal challenges to his candidacy contending that he did not meet the city’s residency requirements to run.

He is now set to be the PRO party’s candidate in August’s primary elections (PASO by their Spanish acronym) which will define the official candidate for the opposition coalition Juntos por el Cambio (JxC). 

Macri was mayor of Vicente López between 2011 and 2021, and following that he joined the current BA city administration as Goverment Minister. His candidacy already had the backing of incumbent City Mayor Horacio Rodríguez Larreta. 

The three legal challenges against Macri’s candidacy were presented by Vanisa Biasi of the Leftist Front as well as Eugenio “Nito” Artaza and Juan Pablo Chiesa from the Frente Renovador. 

They contended that his candidacy violated article 97 of the Buenos Aires City constitution, which states that in order to be elected, among other things, the candidate must “have a routine and permanent residence in the city no less than five years prior to the election date.”

“He was chosen as mayor of Vicente López in 2011, 2015 and 2019, when he said he complied with the residency requirement of living a year in the district,” read Biasi’s legal challenge, according to Télam. 

However, the electoral court said that documents provided by Macri’s laywers gave sufficient proof of his residency in two city addresses between from 1981 and 2006 as well as voting records.

“The expectation by the complaininants to demand that mayoral candidates prove a residency of five years immediately before the election is to misread the clear writing of the local constitution,” read the ruling. “It specifically requires demonstration of a ‘habitual’ and ‘permanent’ residence in the city.”

Macri will be running against Senator and Radical Party (UCR, by its Spanish acronym) member Martín Lousteau, who has been a vocal critic of his candidacy, in the JxC’s PASO.

“We porteños [residents of Buenos Aires City] deserve another kind of respect, we deserve to have people that want to govern us who actually know our city, what affects us, what we enjoy and what needs to be solved,”  Lousteau told media, criticizing Macri’s career as the mayor of the Vicente López municipality — both its smaller scope and his political acumen.

“Until a few days ago he was running a municipality that’s the size of Belgrano and the City has 48 neighborhoods. Knowledge of the city doesn’t require walking during a campaign but working for a long time, having a team, and proposals.”

—Herald/Télam