Milei Aims to Conquer Buenos Aires with Insults Directed at Its Governor: “Fool,” “Little Stalin,” and “Eunuch Donkey”

Javier Milei declared the start of the mother of all electoral battles in Argentina, the fight for control of the province of Buenos Aires, which accounts for 38% of the country’s population and is currently governed by Peronism, the main opposition to his government. He did so, of course, in his unique style: with insults of every kind directed at the provincial governor, Axel Kicillof, whom he called “idiot,” “eunuch donkey,” and simultaneously but not ironically, “czar of misery” and “little Stalin,” among other things. This was just the beginning of the tension leading to the provincial legislative elections in September and the national elections in October.

The far-right president launched his party’s electoral campaign, La Libertad Avanza (LLA), at an event held this Thursday in the city of La Plata. To leave no doubt about the importance he places on the provincial elections, where he aims to defeat Peronism in its stronghold, Milei arrived in the capital of Buenos Aires accompanied by many of his ministers. As is his custom, he praised his Cabinet and thanked them for carrying out “the best government in Argentine history,” a hyperbole that has become a cliché in his speeches.

Milei was the last speaker at the gathering, which brought together about a thousand people, and called on the people of Buenos Aires to adopt “the model of freedom,” as he defines the plan for dismantling the state and deregulating the economy that he has been applying nationally for a year and a half. “Today [Buenos Aires] is going through a terrible present under the mandate of the little Stalin, Axel Kicillof.” “If this course continues, the province will become a giant slum. A model of violence and illiteracy,” stated the president, whose party is negotiating a Buenos Aires alliance with the PRO, the group of former president Mauricio Macri.

The Peronist government, Milei insisted, “is a disaster,” with an “absurd” deficit and “a lack of control over numbers” because “the Soviet [Kicillof] struggles to add, he can’t even add with an abacus.” “Has this idiot never considered cutting public spending? […] While we pass the chainsaw, he spends what he doesn’t have. Nothing good can come from someone with such limited thinking,” he growled as his supporters applauded. He then added a new expression to his list of names that combine the animalization of his rivals and sexual metaphors: “They’re donkeys… without the attribute,” he said. “Kicillof is the eunuch donkey.”

In the end, the president linked his attacks on the governor to his usual anti-state preaching. “Kicillof is the last czar of misery, the heir to a model destined for failure that has destroyed everything it touched. He is hiding in his Kremlin, which is the provincial government […] The state is the embodiment of evil, and we will end all these mental parasites of the state party.” Milei concluded his speech after stating that “the enemy has been identified” and “the terms of battle have been defined.”

Governor Kicillof responded to Milei’s attacks on Friday. “In the province of Buenos Aires, we believe that the one who insults and shouts does so because they have no reason,” he said. “My best response to the insults is to continue making an effort to protect all the victims of Javier Milei’s policies,” he added. “When he comes out insulting, it’s because there are topics he doesn’t want to talk about. I don’t know if it’s a marketing strategy or a matter of personal immaturity,” he estimated. He emphasized his political differences: “In Buenos Aires, the chainsaw does not enter, because it goes against the university, against public health, against police cars, and against the rights of the people.”

The province of Buenos Aires has been governed since 2019 by Kicillof, who was re-elected in 2023, when Milei was winning the presidential elections. Divided and fragmented, Peronism is trying to rebuild itself ahead of the legislative elections, now without Cristina Kirchner’s candidacy, who has been sentenced to six years in prison and a permanent prohibition from holding public office.

The government has separated the local legislative elections from the national ones, which will be held in October, in an effort to mitigate Milei’s strategy of centralizing the campaign around his figure and the nationalization of the debate. Coalitions must be defined by July 9, and candidate lists by July 19. Then the countdown will begin until September 7, when the people of Buenos Aires will go to the polls.