Valen Iricibar 
A legal document has been circulating on social media and across Argentine media with libertarian presidential hopeful Javier Milei’s electoral platform, which showcases a plethora of extreme right-wing proposals to “guarantee traditional styles of life.”
The platform was made public by lawyer and Yale University law doctor Natalia Volosin, who shared the legal document on her Twitter account.
“This is important information, it’s of public interest. In general, Argentina pays little attention to the concrete proposals from politicians and they’re not issues that are discussed,” Volosin told the Herald. “If I published the same thing from [ruling coalition Frente para Todos FdT] or [opposition coalition Juntos por el Cambio JxC] it would probably be very boring. With Milei it’s interesting and people tend to be interested because the proposals are so controversial.”
The document is a request for the judiciary to officially recognize the far-right La Libertad Avanza political alliance in order to run in this year’s elections. If approved, it would be a coalition comprised of three national parties (Partido Demócrata, Renovador Federal and Unión Celeste y Blanco) and five provincial parties (La Libertad Avanza in La Rioja, Fuerza Republicana in Tucumán, Republicanos Unidos in Tierra del Fuego, Ciudadanos por Chubut and ADN from San Juan).
“It wasn’t information that was published on the party’s website, I found it directly in the legal document,” Volosin said. “I don’t know if they were interested in having it made public now or not.”
Several of the sociopolitical proposals outlined in the document would mean the reversal of current legislation. The tone is distinct, calling for the “defense of the right to life since conception” — alluding to Milei’s anti-abortion stance which would directly contradict the country’s 2020 law— and calling to “guarantee traditional styles of life.”
The document targets specific laws such as the country’s Integral Sexual Education (ESI) Law, stating that the alliance would “eliminate its obligatory nature.” The ESI mandates sexual education at every level of schooling (public or private) — it’s considered key to addressing systemic issues such as child abuse and LGBTQIA+ discrimination by teaching minors about their bodies, consent, sexuality, and gender identity from an early age.
Despite its mandatory nature, there have been calls across the board for the ESI to be appropriately enforced — as with several issues there is a gap between policy and practice.
Other points in the La Libertad Avanza electoral platform include lowering the age of criminal responsibility of minors, deregulating the firearms market, deporting foreigners that commit crimes, and establishing a “public-private system” for both the construction and management of Argentina’s incarceration system. The alliance also calls for the “unification of security systems” which would mean merging the military with police forces to create a “national security system” — this hard-line measure is a first for the platform.
“There’s an interesting contradiction in a party that calls itself ‘freedom advances’ and presents itself as a party that represents ‘liberalism’ while at the same time clearly demonstrating against a large portion of individual rights and the main conquests of liberalism,” said Volosin. “Starting with the principle of personal autonomy by which everyone can choose their own life plan.”
“Chainsaw Plan” confirmed
When it comes to economic measures, the document further confirms Milei’s stated hopes for a “sharp cut in the state’s public spending” and “progressive elimination of social plans.” This would include slashing funds for public employment, social security, welfare, and pensions.
It also mentions privatizing the public health system through a “reform of the health system with a boost from the private sector” which would “promote laws for patients and doctors to agree on how much health services cost.”
However, as he has previously said, Milei’s main economic proposal is “dollarization” – the closure of the Central Bank, the abolition of the peso, and the usage of the US dollar as Argentina’s official currency. He announced the idea at the Llao Llao Forum in April as part of the “Chainsaw Plan,” his name for his economic program.
Think tank Fundar wrote a report that analyzed the dollarization proposal and its Economic Department Director Guido Zack told the Herald that dollarization is “not only undesirable, but it is also impossible in the current Argentine context.”
“We calculated a conversion exchange rate of AR$2,280 if we only factor in the monetary base and of AR$7,070 if we also take the interest-bearing liabilities,” he said.
“It is not a solution for the problems of the Argentine economy.”
—additional reporting by Facundo Iglesia
