In the next sixty days, Axel Kicillof is going to make his diary available to Sergio Massa. From now until October, every time the candidate minister wants to do an activity in Buenos Aires, the governor will be there next to him, hugging for the photo, asking for the vote for the complete Union for the Fatherland (UP) ballot. Along with the work for his re-election, is going to become the number one militant of Massa’s presidential candidacy.
As soon as the result of the PASO on Sunday was processed, which in the governor’s office was lived with the satisfaction of the task accomplished, Kicillof and his campaign team headed north for two crucial months, which separates them from the general elections of October 22. The minimum objective is to preserve the difference with their Buenos Aires rivals to achieve the long-awaited second term, but also, and at this point with almost equal importance, to put the head of the Treasury Palace in the ballotage by pushing with all the votes that can be obtained in the province; even, with the suspicion that this strategy will make him the moving target of all the opposition candidates: “They are going to try to break Axel to lower Sergio”, they affirm in La Plata.
Almost at midnight on Sunday, at the end of a day of mixed feelings due to the victory in Buenos Aires but the electoral crash of Javier Miley, Kicillof showed some of the cards that he will play in this second stage of the campaign. The strategy will aim at confronting the minarchist, because the objective is -as he said Cristina Fernandez de Kirchner before anyone else- enter the ballotage. Although it may be against any of the other candidates, in the government they believe that it would be better against Milei than against Patricia Bullrich.
Under this analysis, the idea of the need to confront both Carolina Piparo and Néstor Grindetti is installed at the provincial level. “We need them both alive, eating votes between them”explain to Letter P an operator of the provincial Peronism.
“Now we have rivals that we didn’t have before. Before it was ‘the right’. Now they have a first and last name”They say near Kicillof. They won’t admit it, but they think that Grindetti is a suitable rival for them, better than Santilli. Not only because he “made the JxC ballot lose” in Lanús, but because he “has against” the management of the Independiente club. “We compete with a candidate that all the Independiente fans whore around”, they chicanean in La Plata.
Regarding his own performance, the almost 2.9 million votes that Kicillof garnered and that left him as the most voted candidate generated satisfaction in the governorship, especially because they believe that the governor “came out alive” from a very difficult challenge and has a lot of to grow, especially in the sectors that did not go to vote in the PASO and on which the focus will be placed to mobilize them to the polls in October.
“The election is won and lost in October, not before. We needed a stop that would show us where we are and it showed us very well, within the framework of the expected results. It was an expected number, but above what we thought we were going to take out”, summary near Kicillof.
Therefore, all guns will now be aimed at supporting and lifting Massa. Kicillof is going to do all the activities that the presidential candidate wants to do in Buenos Aires, although in La Plata they understand that the minister will have to focus above all on the interior of the country, where he had more adverse results.
“We depend on him. And he needs everything that can be pulled,” they say in La Plata. In the remaining sixty days of the campaign, there will be a lot of Sergio’s presence along with Axel in the campaign, but there will also be a lot of emphasis on the discursive. Kicillof is going to stress the need for the entire ballot to be military and will repeat what a Bullrich or Milei government would imply for the province of Biuenos Aires.
“We are going to explain that it would be very dangerous for the province if Milei or Bullrich win. It is a province that is in great need of resources, works, that production, activity, and employment do not fall. Bullrich and Milei have a program that is very harmful, very harmful for the province. It is the main argument to defend the complete ballot”, they advance in the environment of the governor.
