Despite 'Clear Defeat' in Key Buenos Aires Election, Argentina's Milei Pledges to 'Deepen' Austerity Measures

Voters in Argentina's Buenos Aires province on Sunday sent a clear message to right-wing President Javier Milei, delivering a decisive defeat of his La Libertad Avanza party and forcing him to concede after his party's candidate to lead the country's most populous province won just 34% of the vote.

But even as Milei admitted LLA had suffered a "clear defeat," he suggested he'll do little in the way of course correction ahead of Argentina's midterm elections scheduled for October and will instead move full grospeed ahead with his so-called "chainsaw" economic austerity measures.

Former President Cristina Fernández de Kirchner advised the president, "Get out of your bubble, brother" as her progressive Peronist party's candidate, Gabriel Katapodis, won 47.4% of the vote.

"Did you see, Milei?" said Kirchner on social media. "Things are getting heavy."

But Milei said his party will not retreat "one millimeter" from its plans to slash public spending, and will "deepen and accelerate" its push for deregulation, which has also included the dismissal of tens of thousands of public employees.

Last month, the country saw mass protests after Milei vetoed a bill that would have increased pensions and disability spending. He said the legislation had been approved by Congress in an "irresponsible manner" and said the spending increases would amount to too much of the gross domestic product.

"The only way to make Argentina great again is with effort and honesty, not the same old recipes," said Milei at the time, echoing US President Donald Trump, who has also presided over mass firings of civil servants and demanded massive cuts to public spending to pay for tax cuts for the richest Americans.

While Argentina's inflation rate has gone down in the first two years of Milei's presidency, unemployment numbers are at their highest since 2021 and many Argentinians have trouble affording basics.

Axel Kicillof, the left-wing governor of Buenos Aires province, said Sunday's vote had sent an undeniable message to the president.

"The ballot boxes told Milei that public works cannot be halted. They explained to him that retirees cannot be beaten, that people with disabilities cannot be abandoned," said Kicillof.

Nacho Torres, governor of Chubut province, added that the election was a "wake-up call from the citizenry."

The Peronists now control the largest bloc in Argentina's Congress and have passed social spending measures, countering Milei' "chainsaw" agenda.

In order to make his desired cuts, Milei needs to expand his party's small minority in Congress next month. Half of the seats in the lower chamber and a third of Senate seats are in play in the upcoming elections.

Sunday's results represented "a key data point to understand the social mood—where the opposition stands, the state of Peronism, and the level of support for the government in Argentina's most important electoral district," Juan Cruz Díaz, the head of the consulting group Cefeidas Group, told The Associated Press.

How Milei reacts, Díaz added, "will be crucial to understanding the evolving political map."