The 2025 Argentine elections will define the stability and future of Milei's government

The world is going through a turning point and Argentina, with its upcoming legislative elections, is positioned at the center of global tensions. The reaffirmation of US power under a new Trumpist era and the possible post-war in Ukraine promise to reconfigure the geopolitical chessboard. Latin America faces its own dilemma: economic crises, social discontent and the advance of populist leaderships of different kinds. In this context, Argentina is not an exception, but it is a key player. The upcoming elections will define not only Javier Milei's governability, but also the path that the country will take in the face of the new world order: will it deepen its alignment with the new global far right or will it face the limits of its libertarian experiment?

The Argentine president has started 2025 by withdrawing the country from the WHO, applauding Trumpist policies, threatening to withdraw from the Paris Agreement, declaring war on “woke ideology,” meeting with Musk, and in recent days, promoting a fraudulent cryptocurrency that has led to lawsuits and impeachment requests. This year, Argentina faces an election that will redefine the traditional forces - Peronism led by the Justicialist Party (PJ) and the center-right led by the Republican Proposal (PRO) - after the disorganization they suffered with Milei's victory. On October 26, half of the deputies in the Argentine Congress and a third of its senators will be renewed, and there will be legislative elections in 12 provinces and in the Autonomous City of Buenos Aires.

Depending on the results, the political scene will begin to take shape for the 2027 presidential elections. The PRO, led by former President Mauricio Macri, is seeking to articulate possible alliances within the center-right spectrum, as it did in previous elections with the Unión Cívica Radical, the Coalición Cívica ARI, and sectors of non-Kirchnerist Peronism. Although the incorporation of several PRO leaders into the government and the recent statements by the Argentine president stating that “with the PRO we go together everywhere or else we will go separately,” do not rule out the possibility of establishing alliances with Milei’s party, La Libertad Avanza.

The Argentine president's sister, Karina Milei, also allegedly involved in the cryptocurrency controversy, is in charge of structuring the libertarian party in all provinces, which only has 39 seats out of a total of 257 in the Chamber of Deputies.

As for Peronism, the former president and leader of the Justicialist Party since November 2024, Cristina Kirchner, is trying to reconfigure the Peronist ideological space that brought her to the presidency on two occasions. The non-Kirchnerist Peronists who already ran unsuccessfully in the previous presidential elections, under the leadership of the former governor of the province of Córdoba Juan Schiaretti, have registered the Hacemos party, with which they intend to compete for the center space and all the Peronists dissatisfied with Kirchner.

There is currently a panorama of deep parliamentary fragmentation. The political spaces that risk the most in the legislative elections are those that were victorious in the 2021 election, that is, the parties that made up the right-wing coalition Juntos por el Cambio and the Kirchnerist coalition Frente de Todos. May 15, 2025 is the deadline for the parties to request the recognition of alliances or confederations before the National Electoral Directorate. With these elections, in addition to the support or rejection of the presidential administration, it will be known who dominates on the right and what is the survival capacity of Kirchner, a possible candidate for the 2027 presidential elections.

On the other hand, the province of Buenos Aires and the capital are key in all Argentine elections, since they account for almost half of the population, although something changed with Javier Milei. The president and his political movement caused a rupture in national politics in the last presidential elections, and they did so with great support from voters in the interior. Although Milei was born in the capital, he was able to express the anger of deep Argentina with the metropolitan area of ​​Buenos Aires, which is the emblematic territory of poverty and insecurity. In the province of Buenos Aires, Kirchnerism has been dominant in recent decades, as well as in the capital the center-right. However, the capital and the province no longer represent the bases of support for the national government, as was demonstrated in the first round of the presidential elections, where Macri's party won in the capital, and Kirchnerism in the province. Although given the population weight, Milei has his two key electoral battles there.

In the year and a half since the libertarian's victory, his government has shown the ability to maintain decrees of necessity and uphold his vetoes, but not to sanction his own projects. The Executive has reduced monthly inflation to single digits, after reaching 25% in December 2023, but the possible social cost of the fiscal adjustment remains to be seen, as well as the deepening of political fractures due to Milei's provocative presidential style. The ruling party seeks to achieve a parliamentary majority in these elections that will allow it to advance the promised structural reforms, such as the privatization of public companies, including Correo Argentino and Aerolíneas Argentinas. However, measures like this require legislative approval, since a privatization via a decree of necessity and urgency could be declared unconstitutional. The opposition, for its part, hopes to consolidate a majority that will stop these decrees and reverse some already challenged in court, such as those related to labor reform or the privatization of clubs.

What impact could elections have on candidates' future aspirations? In the last five national legislative elections since 2005, incumbent governments won twice and were defeated three times. However, the defeat of Kirchnerism in 2009 did not prevent its reelection in 2011, nor did the success of Macri's government in 2017 guarantee its continuity in 2019. A good legislative result can strengthen the capacity to implement reforms and expand territorial influence, but it does not necessarily influence the change or permanence of the political sign in the next presidential elections.

Will the Argentine establishment be able to stop Milei's brutality before it provokes a social explosion? The relative stability of prices and the exchange rate could allow him to retain the support of a sector that values ​​these advances positively, since, in general, the dollar is seen as the main indicator of political and economic stability in Argentina.

Who will benefit from the enormous lithium and gas reserves of an Argentina that still lacks a robust industry? In a crucial election year for the country, its course is at a crossroads in a world that is redefining its alliances. While Milei promises an adjustment both internally and externally, his plan to distance Argentina from China, abandoning the BRICS, and strengthen ties with the new US administration, supported by his good relationship with Musk and Trump, could have repercussions on the exploitation of its natural resources, especially in a context of growing competition for raw materials. However, the uncertainty generated by the redefinition of international alliances and the controversy surrounding Milei's promotion of a fraudulent cryptocurrency calls into question its apparent stability. Time, elections and government decisions will define whether Argentina manages to take advantage of its resources and stabilize its course or whether it remains trapped in the uncertainty of a world in transformation.