While the presidential candidate of La Libertad advances, Javier Mileytoured the TV channels to celebrate his victory in the primary elections, his sister Karina, campaign manager, held a meeting with his team to begin to define the guidelines of the new stage.
One of the first definitions they took was that of intervene in the districts in which the libertarian obtained the fewest votes, which are the City of Buenos Aires and Entre Ríos. In the next few days they will discuss a strategy for the province of Buenos Aires, where Milei met expectations, but she needs to grow if she wants to reach the Casa Rosada.
In the three districts, the national primaries were simultaneous to the local ones and in October the governor will be voted together with the president. “Our ceiling was 25 points at the national level, so 20 is not below expectations. But since the ambition is to win, we are going to seek to grow the same,” they explained in Milei’s bunker, where They still could not speak with him, because he is still focused on his media agenda.
Karina Milei discussed these matters with the two owners of the national campaign, Carlos Kikuchi y Julio Serna, claimed with Sunday’s result, after the internal tensions that went through the closure of lists. The deputy recognized them for having achieved the legal instrument to compete and celebrated the victory with them.
Karina, Kikuchi and Serna were also the ones who defined the moment when Milei had to go down from the 21st floor of the Libertador Hotel to the bunker set up on the first floor of the same building to give her speech. As of this Monday, they are in charge of coordinating the campaign for the general elections and in their first meeting they outlined seven objectives to be met, so that the deputy can become President of the Nation.
Several of them were explained by Milei in her interviews, such as the need to add those who did not go to vote on Sunday and will do so on October 22. It is not a minor figure: participation in the primaries was just under 70% of the electorate and the average growth in the general elections is 10 points.
Absenteeism and control
The diagnosis of La libertad Avanza is that among those who did not go to school this Sunday there are many voters angry with the system that, if they attend in October, it would not be to accompany the Government. That’s why they seek to polarize with JxC to make sure of them. In addition, they believe that this portion of the electorate can choose Milei because, unlike what happened a week ago, they know that libertarians can win and they would not be throwing away their suffrage. “In general elections, the one who comes out third always yields votes, but never the first or the second. This time it will not be different,” they maintain in the deputy’s environment.
Another goal for October is improve control, which had serious problems, mitigated by the final result, but not forgotten by those in charge of coordinating it. Without the capacity to guard all the tables, in schools without a libertarian presence there were complaints of shortages and systematic breaking of ballots. Until, they say, people appeared in local supporters to ask for Milei’s ballots that they could not find in the dark rooms.
The area where the most problems were recorded was in the Buenos Aires suburbs, especially in the third electoral section. In Lanús and Avellaneda there were several hours without Milei tickets available; and in a school in Esteban Echeverría, a gendarme stopped the voting because people were asking for La Libertad Avanza ballots and they were nowhere to be found.
Provinces to improve
The City of Buenos Aires was where Milei did the worst: obtained only 17%, with the aggravating circumstance that it is the fourth district in number of voters, only surpassed by Buenos Aires, Córdoba and Santa Fe. In the last two, the libertarian candidate surprised with a first place and a good performance in rural areas, where it was expected to be surpassed by Patricia Bullrich.
In the Buenos Aires territory, the deputy had a lousy performance in areas of ABC 1 like Recoleta, where it reached 13%; it was a few points higher in middle-class regions (such as Caballito and Parque Chacabuco) and only approached 30% in the most popular ones, such as Lugano and La Boca.
Damaged by the concurrent elections, the candidate for head of government, Ramiro Marra, it cost him more: he only reached 13%. The national team’s plan is to capture the City’s independent voter who elected Martin Lousteaubut he does not feel identified with the PRO, a loot that the Kirchnerista also wants to go for Leandro Santoro. Liberals believe Milei’s national primary victory positions them better in that contest.
In Entre Ríos, La Libertad Avanza had 22 points in the presidential election, 10 more than the candidate for governor of the same space, Sebastián etchevehere. In the national command they plan that Milei travels the province since September to grow.
The City and Entre Ríos have other negative data, in the midst of so much national euphoria: LLA did not win in any commune, as in Formosa and Catamarca, where the economist was able to exceed 20%, the maximum objective only seven days ago .
In Buenos Aires, the province that concentrates almost 40% of the register, Milei got 24%. The breakdown for each Buenos Aires region will be made these days with the candidate for governor Carolina Píparowhich unlike Etchevehere only had a few tenths of a cut.
The first draft of the campaign team detected a very even distribution of percentages among the eight electoral sections, but with chances of improving in the suburbs, with better supervision, a task that was in charge of the candidate for provincial senator sebastian couplewho joined LLA for management of Martin Menem.
Milei is satisfied with the performances in the big cities of the Buenos Aires interior, but she can grow in small rural districts, which add by trickle and are decisive in an even election. It will be part of the new campaign, which begins in September, with the economist in first place.
