Argentina’s Supreme Court on Thursday rejected Ariel Lijo’s request to take leave from his post as a federal judge, taking the government by surprise and raising doubts over the magistrate’s nomination for the nation’s highest court.
Government sources said President Javier Milei’s administration was caught unaware by the ruling, which was leaked by local media outlets before being officially announced.
To make matters worse, the ruling was supported by Lijo’s fellow-nominee Manuel García-Mansilla, who joined the Supreme Court last week by decree in a move that sparked controversy.
The only dissenting opinion came from Supreme Court justice Ricardo Lorenzetti, who signed in favour of the Comodoro Py judge’s request to enter the Supreme Court without resigning his current post first.
The ruling is a setback for Milei, who has failed to win support for his bid to appoint Lijo to the remaining vacant Supreme Court bench.
The President last week attempted to impose Lijo and García-Mansilla via Decree 137/2025, a move which was heavily criticised by constitutional experts.
García-Mansilla was sworn into office last week, but Lijo’s position as a federal judge delayed any action.
The Casa Rosada is yet to decide its next steps, but officials were caught unaware by the ruling.
“The vote still hasn’t [officially] taken place,” an important government official told Noticias Argentinas news agency at noon on Thursday as doubts circulated in the corridors of power.
The decision, yet to be published or made official at press time, was signed by Supreme Court Chief Justice Horacio Rosatti and Justices Carlos Rosenkrantz and Manuel García-Mansilla. It was leaked while Lorenzetti was preparing his dissenting opinión.
According to local media outlets, García-Mansilla gave no prior notice of his rejection of Lijo’s request, rocking those in government who had worked to land both presidential nominees on the Supreme Court.
Figures close to Presidential Chief-of-Staff Karina Milei argued this “showed the court independence proposed by the government,” according to Noticias Argentinas. There is "no automatic majority” on the court, they added.
This new pebble in the shoe for Lijo’s appointment complicates his situation, forcing him to face the decision of whether or not to resign from the fourth federal courtroom of Comodoro Py.
“It’s a personal decision, we have already done what we could,” an important source said about the judge’s now uncertain future.
The only certainty is the government guarantee that they will insist on Lijo’s nomination, promising that it will not be withdrawn. Pressure on the judge to resign his post will now increase.
Despite this setback, there are still hopes of obtaining the necessary votes in the Senate. If the Upper House agrees to debate his nomination and the government obtains the necessary two-thirds majority, Lijo could enter the Supreme Court for life.
Of the two judges picked by the government to round out the numbers in the Supreme Court, Lijo was the only one to obtain a favourable ruling in the Appointments Committee thanks to the signatures of nine senators including the Peronists Sergio Uñac (San Juan), Lucía Corpacci (Catamarca) and Claudia Abdala de Zamora (Santiago del Estero).
However, the federal judge has been heavily criticised for having criminal complaints in the courts against him, his failure to progress on several high-profile cases and alleged links to corruption. Some legal NGOs sought to challenge the nominations.
Lijo’s nomination was due to be debated on February 20 during extraordinary sessions on Congress but Deputy Justice Minister Sebastián Amerio, linked to presidential advisor Santiago Caputo, did not manage to reach agreement with the followers of ex-president Cristina Fernández de Kirchner to clinch the necessary votes for approval.
The Kirchnerites wanted to stretch the agreement to include the Attorney-General and 150 vacant benches nationwide within the package, according to reports, prompting Amerio to withdraw from negotiations.
– TIMES/PERFIL/NA
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