Argentina's President Javier Milei has led his party to a landslide victory in Sunday's midterm elections, after defining the first two years of his presidency with radical spending cuts and free-market reforms.
His party, La Libertad Avanza, won nearly 41% of the vote, taking 13 of 24 Senate seats and 64 of the 127 lower-house seats that were contested. His gains will make it easier for Milei to push ahead with his programme to slash state spending and deregulate the economy.
President Donald Trump congratulated Milei on social media, saying: He's making us all look good. Before the vote, Trump made it clear a $40bn US lifeline for Argentina would depend on Milei keeping political momentum. Milei's supporters welcomed that, though critics accused Trump of foreign interference in Argentina's elections.
In a nod to his North American ally, Milei told cheering supporters: We must consolidate the path of reform we have embarked upon to turn Argentina's history around once and for all… to make Argentina great again. Before these elections his party had just seven Senate seats and 37 seats in the lower house, which meant his programme of spending cuts and reforms faced various political obstacles. His vetoes of bills to boost funding for state universities, people with disabilities and children's healthcare were all overturned by opposition lawmakers.
After Sunday's result, hundreds of his supporters gathered, cheering, outside a hotel in Buenos Aires where he was watching the result. Milei didn't have 15% of Congress in his favour. Now, with many more deputies and senators, he'll be able to change the country in a year, one young voter called Dionisio said.
These elections were the first national test of President Milei's popularity since he took office in 2023, pledging to shrink state spending by taking a metaphorical chainsaw to it. He's since cut budgets for education, pensions, health, infrastructure, and subsidies, and laid off tens of thousands of public sector workers.
Supporters, including Trump, hail him for taming inflation - which hit triple figures annually before he took office - cutting the deficit, and restoring investor confidence. His critics, though, argue the price has been job losses, a decline in manufacturing, crumbling public services, a fall in people's purchasing power and an imminent recession.
Milei has also kept inflation down by propping up the peso, leaving it overvalued and draining reserves ahead of $20bn of debt repayments next year. This had caused alarm that Argentina could be hurtling towards an economic crisis.
Financial markets are expected to rally after the win: a sign that, for now, Milei's political survival has also kept his economic experiment alive - and US support in place. His new mandate gives him the power to implement more radical changes ahead of the next presidential election in 2027, when his name could be on the ballot once more.
