OPINION:
International experts wrote off Javier Milei as a flash in the pan. Pollsters waved charts insisting the wild-haired libertarian economist who claimed Argentina’s presidency in 2023 was doomed as his party headed into the midterm elections on Oct. 26.
The critics couldn’t have been more wrong. Mr. Milei’s team cleaned house, grabbing 40% of the vote, compared with just 24% for the Peronist faction. “This resounding victory for La Libertad Avanza is a triumph of the Argentine people’s unyielding spirit for freedom, prosperity, and the defeat of the socialist scourge that has plagued our nation for far too long,” Mr. Milei wrote on X.
He thanked President Trump and Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent for their shared belief in “MAGA,” making both Argentina and America great again. On the eve of voting, the U.S. Treasury signed a $20 billion economic stabilization agreement with the Central Bank of Argentina to ease the panic caused by media Cassandras after party losses in a few local elections.
Pundits proclaimed pro-freedom candidates had no chance in the midterms, and anxious investors were terrified that the Marxists would return. Mr. Trump soothed their fears.
“I’m doing something I don’t often do. I’m giving a full endorsement to him,” Mr. Trump said in a September meeting with Mr. Milei. “To the people of Argentina, we’re backing him 100%. We think he’s done a fantastic job. He, like us, inherited a terrible mess, and what he’s done to fix it is good.”
Instead of bribing voters with endless parades of subsidies and giveaways, Mr. Milei took a chain saw to government waste and inefficiency. He slashed regulations. He implemented every scheme on the public policy wish list of free market economists, and the results were transformative.
Fans of big government solutions derided Mr. Milei as “crazy,” “radical” and “insane,” yet he turned a financial basket case into something closer to a functioning economy with a balanced budget. The inflation rate went from 211% to 31%. That’s still too much, but Mr. Milei has more to do before facing the electorate a second time in 2027. Until then, his success is inspiring neighbors to give liberty a chance.
Taking note of Argentina’s fiscal rehabilitation, the people of Bolivia cast out the socialist candidate for the first time in two decades. Rodrigo Paz scored 55% of the vote on a platform that seeks to strengthen ties with Washington, not Beijing and Moscow.
Mr. Trump congratulated another ally to the south, Daniel Noboa, “who will be a great leader for the wonderful people of Ecuador” after he secured reelection earlier this year. Mr. Noboa encouraged economic growth, low inflation and a restoration of law and order. “To those who choose violence, the law awaits them. To those who act like criminals, they will be treated as criminals,” he said on X.
El Salvador was a pioneer in this respect. It elected conservative Nayib Bukele in 2019 on his promise to take a nation that was the global trendsetter in murder and mayhem and flip the script. His homeland is now a haven of safety in a brutal world.
The remedy wasn’t complicated. All he did was fix the judicial system and imprison criminals.
“If you don’t impeach the corrupt judges, you cannot fix the country. They will form a cartel (a judicial dictatorship) and block all reforms, protecting the systemic corruption that put them in their seats,” Mr. Bukele wrote on X.
That’s a plan worth emulating.
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