The ruling Frente Renovador de la Concordia emerged victorious in Sunday’s legislative elections in Misiones, although President Javier Milei’s La Libertad Avanza list rallied to a strong second place.
With 98.9 percent of votes tallied, the ruling front’s list – headed by top candidate Sebastián Macías – secured 28.6 percent of the vote, followed by the libertarian slate headed by retired tennis player Diego Hartfield with 21.89 percent.
In a surprise third place came the pro-life movement Por La Vida y los Valores, led by jailed former police officer Ramón Amarilla, which garnered 19.12 percent.
Amarilla is currently being held at Cerro Azul’s Unidad Penal VIII on charges of sedition and conspiracy against the provincial government. He was arrested in September, 2024 for his mass police protests demanding better salaries and working conditions.
Amarilla’s candidacy had initially been challenged by provincial electoral prosecutor Flavio Marino Morchio due to his ongoing pre-trial detention but authorities ultimately approved his run. It is the first time in Misiones’ political history that a detained individual has been elected to the provincial legislature.
While his election is now confirmed, it remains unclear under what conditions Amarilla – worked for more than 30 years in the Misiones provincial police force – will he be able to take his seat in the legislature, as he does not yet have a firm conviction?
Just over one million people were eligible to vote in the election, which selected representatives for the provincial legislature, with 20 of the 40 seats in the region’s unicameral chamber up for renewal. Local mayors and councillors were also elected.
Turnout, according to the Dirección General del Centro de Cómputos de Misiones, was a disappointing 55.41 percent.
The result is a victory for provincial strongman Carlos Rovira, who, along with Misiones Province Governor Hugo Passalacqua, dominates the regional political scene. However, party leaders will note a drop of almost 10 points from their share of the vote in the previous election. If the libertarian sector had unified into a single list, the damage could have been more severe.
“Thanks to the people of Misiones, we’ve taken another step in defending what we believe in: our ideals, which today are spreading across the country. Today, renewal was consecrated because within our ranks we have young people with liberal, Peronist, Radical, and independent views,” Rovira said during remarks at the ruling front’s campaign headquarters.
Accompanied on stage by Passalacqua, he added: “You won’t find this anywhere else in the country. That’s why we are who we are, thanks to the popular vote. In Misiones, renewal continues to uphold the banners of the past, the present and the future.”
President Milei and his team, however, will read the results – which establish La Libertad Avanza as the second-strongest force in the province – as a sign of his movement’s growing popularity in Argentina’s north.
Last weekend, the party sent some of its biggest hitters north to boost campaigning in the final days, among them Presidential Chief-of-Staff Karina Milei, Security Minister Patricia Bullrich and Lower House Speaker Martín Menem.
“We ran a great campaign, we won in many municipalities, and for the first time we managed to elect LLA deputies and councillors in Misiones,” Hartfield said, according to local press reports after the vote.
He claimed the odds were stacked against Milei’s libertarian force. “The vote-counting process was a disgrace, with sympathetic media outlets publishing data before the official site did. It was riddled with errors making us the laughing-stock of the entire country,” said the former sports star.
None of the other party slates topped 10 percent, with the national Partido Justicialista calling on its voters to back the Confluencia Popular por la Patria, which finished in a lowly seventh place.
In fourth place was the Frente Agrario y Social, led by veteran politician Héctor ‘Cacho’ Bárbaro, with 8.88 percent, according to preliminary results. Bárbaro broke with Kirchnerism to head his own ticket, which drew considerable support in the Alto Uruguay region.
Fifth place, with 8.3 percent, went to the Partido Libertario, led by pro-Milei national deputy Martín Arjol, who spurned his former UCR allies and LLA to run on a distinct libertarian ticket.
Frente Unidos por el Futuro – supported by the Unión Cívica Radical, PRO and the Coalición Cívica – earned 5.73 percent of the vote with a list headed by Santiago Nicolás Koch.
The aforementioned Confluencia Popular por la Patria alliance, which grouped together Peronist sectors in the absence of a formal PJ candidate, finished seventh with just 2.47 percent of the vote.
– TIMES/NA/PERFIL
Comments