BUENOS AIRES (CN) — With annual inflation hitting 138% and the local peso continuing to lose value at a dizzying rate, Argentines are looking for a way out as they prepare to elect a new president this month. Five presidential hopefuls, including a far-right libertarian and the country’s center-left economy minister, offer fundamentally differing answers to the country’s economic crisis.
Javier Milei, an ultraconservative economist and political outsider, emerged as the election’s frontrunner in a stunning August primary upset, taking home the highest vote total at 30%. The eccentric admirer of Donald Trump and former Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro has amassed a devoted — and very much online — following, running on a pledge to abolish Argentina’s central bank and adopt the U.S. dollar as its official currency.
Milei’s rivals include Sergio Massa, who currently serves as the minister of economy in the center-left government led by President Alberto Fernández; and Patricia Bullrich, a center-right political veteran with a tough-on-crime reputation.
Rounding out the ballot are two candidates with essentially nonexistent chances: socialist politician Myriam Bregman and Juan Schiaretti, who currently serves as governor of Argentina’s Córdoba province.
These five candidates will face off for the presidency on Oct. 22, though by all indications, it’s a three-horse race between Bullrich, Massa and Milei. If no candidate clears the 45% vote threshold — or 40%, with a margin of victory of at least 10% — needed to win the presidency in one round, a Nov. 19 runoff between the top two candidates will decide Argentina's fate.
Voting in the South American country is mandatory for all citizens from 18 to 69, and optional for 16- and 17-year-olds, as well as anyone over 70.
Public opinion polls severely underestimated Milei’s popularity ahead of the primary. Now, they largely have him in first place, with Massa trailing closely behind. The controversial frontrunner is particularly popular among male voters and young voters, polling suggests.
One of those voters is David Urbani, a 20-year-old studying economics at the National University of Mar del Plata. In 2018, Urbani stumbled upon Milei in a YouTube video and was enthralled by his libertarian ideology and radical economic proposals.
“There are a whole bunch of kids like me, who maybe weren’t interested in politics,” Urbani said, speaking from his home in Mar del Plata, a resort city on Argentina’s Atlantic coast. “But they heard this guy and thought, ‘what he’s saying makes sense.’”
Dollarization is the central promise of a Milei presidency. The candidate maintains that, through abolishing the central bank and replacing pesos with U.S. dollars, he can create an inflation-free Argentina. In a country that has suffered from double-digit inflation for over a decade, it's a promise that holds great allure. However, many economists say the country lacks the dollars necessary to implement dollarization, and even if such a move was possible, it could bring more harm than good to Argentina’s working class.
Voters may be willing to take their chances, says Mark P. Jones, who researches Argentine politics and policy at Rice University. “They may say, ‘I'll take that one percent chance of things actually changing, dramatically changing, in a paradigm shift under Milei, versus an effective guarantee of the status quo continuing,’” he said. “The belief there is that the status quo simply isn't working.”
Massa, who became the country’s economic minister in August 2022, will need to overcome that widely held belief if he hopes to beat Milei. Many voters see Massa as synonymous with Argentina’s latest financial woes. In a recent presidential debate, the candidate addressed those critics directly, simultaneously apologizing for and distancing himself from the current administration.