Since Javier Milei shocked Argentina with his unexpected victory in the August primary elections, analysts and newspapers around the world began to highlight the common points between the trajectory of the economist who won the presidential elections this Sunday and that of two other politicians who They also had a surprising rise to power: former US president Donald Trump and Brazil’s Jair Bolsonaro.
Comparisons with Bolsonaro and Trump, two leaders that Milei says he admires, have been made since 2021, when the Argentine who defines himself as a libertarian was elected deputy.
“Make Agentina great again”Trump wrote on the Truth social network, using a version of his campaign slogan.
For his part, Bolsonaro said in X: “Hope shines again in South America” and concluded by greeting Trump, who intends to run for the White House again next year: “May these good winds reach the United States and Brazil so that honesty, progress and freedom return to all of us.”
Milei, Bolsonaro and Trump are often described by some analysts as populist leaders of a new global movement of the “anti-political right” (or, for some, the “radical right” or the “extreme right”) built by questioning the traditional right.
The three present themselves as “outsiders” and gained popularity with a anti-system and anti-elite discourseand the use of social networks to connect directly with their bases.
But, despite several affinities, there are also important differences between the three, which could be reflected in Milei’s government, which will begin in December.
BBC News Brazil spoke to analysts about the main similarities and differences between Milei, Bolsonaro and Trump.
Cultivation of the anti-system and ‘outsider’ image
Like Trump and Bolsonaro, Milei presents herself as someone who not part of the establishment and that he came to fight against the political elites.
“The caste is afraid,” was one of his campaign slogans.
Analysts understand that the “caste”, in the opinion of the now president-elect, would be composed mainly of Kirchnerist politicians, but also of businessmen.
Debutant in politics, Milei’s meteoric rise It is attributed to his speech against “the usual politicians” and the decline of Argentina “of the last hundred years.”
Patricio Navia, a professor at New York University, understands that this characteristic of presenting oneself as outside the political system is the main point of similarity between Milei, Trump and Bolsonaro.
“The three of them are similar in the sense of being anti-system, but they know the system well. And they take advantage of that knowledge to say: ‘I know the system, it is corrupt and it discriminates against you and discriminates against pure and honest people.’
The “anti-system” narrative includes the message that They are the “saviors” who will solve the country’s problemsbecause they are better trained, but also because they will rescue a past that is supposedly better than the current one, says Navia.
“Trump kept the ‘Make America Great Again’ speech.
Milei says that Argentina worked when it opened to the world but since Peronism emerged (80 years ago), the country went into decline. That is, ‘Make Argentina Great Again’.”
Navia sees something similar in Bolsonaro. “But Bolsonaro’s ideal world was that of the return to a Brazil in which the military “They ruled the whole country.”
This image, in all three cases, is reinforced by a discourse marked by a breach of political protocol and a bellicose style.
“All three take advantage of this anti-system component,” says Carlos Gustavo Poggio, professor of International Relations at Berea College, in Kentucky, United States.
Poggio emphasizes that this is not an objective trait, and is more a matter of style than content, in search of connection with voters who consider themselves outside of traditional politics.
But despite the similarities in the way they present themselves, the three leaders have different trajectories.
Milei, was an economist in one of Argentina’s main business groups, Corporación América, which has businesses ranging from airport management to agribusiness and He gained fame with his explosive appearances on television shows.
However, He did not enter politics until 2021, when he was elected deputy. At that time, the bench of his party, La Libertad Avanza, was made up only of him and his current vice presidential candidate, Victoria Villarruel.
Bolsonaro did have three decades of experience as a parliamentarian when he was elected president in 2018.
In the case of Trump, who built his career as a successful businessman, his entry into politics came with his surprising conquest of the Republican Party.
“Trump campaigned as an outsider, he told (voters) that he was not from Washington, that He was going to Washington to shake things up and change them. Also that he would contribute his skills as a businessman,” political scientist Todd Belt, professor at George Washington University, tells BBC Brazil.
Initially rejected by traditional politicians, Trump ended up not only winning the 2016 elections, but also transforming the party in his image and likeness.
Even today, after losing the 2020 election and being the subject of several investigations, Trump remains the leader of the Republican Party and the favorite in the polls to become the Republican presidential candidate in next year’s election.
“Neither Bolsonaro nor Milei have a party structure like Trump’s“, highlights Poggio.
“This is also an important difference. It means that they have to resort to a much more personalistic issue, much more centered on the person, since They cannot resort to partisan discourse“.
Use of social networks and voter base
Both Milei, Trump and Bolsonaro, at first they were not taken seriously by his opponents or by traditional media.
The three leaders are similar in the way they used social media to connect directly with your voter base and then capture press coverage.
With bombastic statements, avoiding “political correctness”, They created viral moments on networks such as Facebook, Twitter or TikTok, and accumulated millions of views. This, in turn, led traditional media to give more and more space to these candidates.
Milei won the fervor of this fan base with strident statements and proposals considered radical.
He rated the climate change of socialist lie, promised to “dynamite” the country’s Central Bank and dollarize the economydescribed the local currency as “excrement” and Pope Francis, who is Argentine, as “evil.”
With a black leather jacket and a microphone in hand, the Argentine maintains a rock image at rallies and public appearances without fearing criticism when he claims that his dogs, genetic clones of his late dog Conan, are the “greatest (political) strategists.” of the world”.
“There is no one who could have use social media to boost traditional media coverage as Trump has done,” says Belt, noting that the success of the 2016 US campaign served as a model for other world leaders.
Poggio points out that there have always been candidates with this style. But, before the popularization of social networks, these politicians were filtered by traditional media and They didn’t get as much coverage..
“In the past, the big newspapers and the big television networks did not cover these types of candidates,” says Poggio.
“Nowadays, with social networks the opposite happens. you get the more participation the worse your language is and the more absurd you are“.
Bolsonaro was elected president in 2018 despite initially having only 8 seconds of electoral propaganda on television.
“This was only possible thanks to this communication fragmentation that exists today, enabled by social networks,” says Poggio
Social networks too They play a central role for Milei.
Its popularity on the platforms is driven by young people from Generation Z, who make up a significant part of its electorate.
Many are disillusioned with traditional politicians, after decades of constant economic crises in the country.
Milei gained strength especially on TikTok, a platform where he has 1.4 million followers.
At their rallies, the presence of young people under 30 years of age, especially men, draws attention.
Many of the voters who helped Trump win the presidency in 2016 were also men, mostly white without a college degree.
But, despite also having many young voters, in the case of Trump and Bolsonaro, the most striking characteristic of their followers is not age, but rather feeling of political, economic and cultural alienation, in Poggio’s opinion.
“They are outside of traditional politics, they feel that they have no place, they feel that politicians do not listen to them, they feel that they need someone who presents themselves as an outsider, who is out of this system and vows to destroy it“says Poggio.
The vision of Argentine Rosendo Fraga, from the Nova Maioria Studies Center, in Buenos Aires, is similar.
For Fraga, the three seem to have understood the frustration of societies due to inequality, which leads sectors to identifying with an “outsider” in search of economic progress, now stagnant, or requests for “greater severity” in public security.
Anti-China and anti-left speech
China, like Brazil, are the constant target of Javier Milei’s criticism.
He stated, on several occasions, that businessmen “are free” to negotiate with “the countries they want,” but that his government It will not have a relationship with any of them despite being Argentina’s main trading partners.
My lei understands that China, governed by the Communist Party, and Brazil, currently chaired by Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, of the leftist Workers’ Party, They are “communist and socialist” countries. and says he wants to distance himself from them.
With these positions, Milei presents himself as anti-communist. Just like Jair Bolsonaro. Both, along with Trump, position themselves against the ideas and policies of the left.
The American, in turn, also used anti-communist rhetoric. In his campaign for the 2024 elections, he has said that he wants prevent the entry of “communists and Marxists” into the country.
Although all three also make statements against China, analysts recall that there are important differences in this context.
For Belt, in the case of Trump, the anti-China discourse is not based on an anti-communist ideology, but is more linked to the fact that many of his followers, who had lost their factory jobs, they blamed China, and the candidate saw this as an opportunity.
“The first thing Trump did when he became president was increase the taxes on certain imports from China“said Professor Patricio Navia, from New York University.
The disputes between both countries were constant during the Trump administration and, to a certain extent, continued under the Joe Biden administration, points out Rosendo Fraga, from the Nova Maioria Studies Center, in Buenos Aires.
Poggio highlights that, despite the similarity of the anti-China discourse, The reality of Brazil and Argentina is very different from that of the United Stateswhich is the greatest power in the world.
“Bolsonaro, as soon as he assumes the presidency, realizes that this anti-China speech could not be applied in reality, because China is Brazil’s largest trading partner. The same thing happens in Argentina. “The Asian giant is one of its largest trading partners.”
Abortion and gay marriage
Milei and Bolsonaro also have similarities in other important issues for the most conservative sectors of societysuch as criticism of what they classify as gender ideology and opposition to the decriminalization of abortion, which occurred in Argentina in 2020.
But, if Bolsonaro presents himself as a defender of the traditional and conservative family, Milei has a different speech, and presents himself not as a conservative, but as an ultraliberal.
Still, Milei, who at one point in his campaign defended the sale of organs (he subsequently stopped mentioning the proposal), does not align himself with individual freedom when the issue is the right to abortion.
Aims to call a plebiscite on the Voluntary Interruption of Abortion Law making it clear that he is against abortion and the way the law was approved in 2021 (with a vote in Congress).
He declared himself “pro-life” by “philosophical, biological and mathematical” conviction.
Carlos Gustavo Poggio, from Colegio Berea, remembers that abortion is an important element because involves the topic of religion and the religious base that supports these candidates.
“But, as in the case of Milei, this basis is not very significant, for him this is not such an important issue,” says Poggio.
“For Bolsonaro it was a central issue, precisely for mobilize more evangelical and religious voters”, Add.
In Trump’s case, one of the milestones of his presidency was the appointment of three conservative justices to the United States Supreme Court, who ended up playing a crucial role in the ruling last year that annulled the constitutional right to abortion, guaranteed since 1973.
But, according to Todd Belt, the former US president did not have a strong conservative perspective on abortion and embraced the issue more because it was politically advantageous than out of personal conviction.
“Trump was never against abortion until he became a candidate,” Belt says.
Following the Supreme Court’s decision, several states passed restrictive abortion laws, and the issue has benefited Democrats in legislative and state elections.
“Trump has realized that this is a problematic issue for Republicans. The ideal for Trump would be not to bring up the issue again. But it will be very difficult, because the Democrats will force him to discuss it in the next presidential election campaign,” says Poggio.
When it comes to gay marriage, an issue that Bolsonarism clearly opposes in Brazil, Milei defends his libertarian credentials and said he is not against same-sex marriage because “individuality must be respected.”
And he even went further to say that he is against the State formalizing any type of marriage. “For me, (a person’s) sexual choice doesn’t matter at all. If a person wants to be with an elephant and has the elephant’s consent, it is a problem between the person and the elephant. (..) What you can do is impose things from the State,” she said during an interview with a Peruvian journalist.
Milei’s phrase caused controversy for mentioning elephants when talking about homosexuality.
The electoral fraud narrative
Trump rejected his defeat at the polls in 2020 and, despite the lack of evidence of irregularities in the elections, he spread the idea among his followers that there had been fraud.
This culminated in the invasion of the Capitol, seat of the US Congress, on January 6, 2021.
A similar episode occurred in Brazil after Bolsonaro’s defeat last year.
Alleging fraud in the electronic voting system, supporters of the defeated president invaded federal government buildings in Brasilia on January 8 of this year.
According to Poggio, Bolsonaro copied Trump’s strategy.
“It is also an important speech for keep the base mobilizeda discourse that reinforces the anti-system identity,” says Poggio.
“’The people love me, but the system is against mehe doesn’t want me to be elected,’” he exemplifies.
“Unfortunately, despite violating democratic norms, it is a successful strategy,” Belt highlights.
“In the United States, all the Republicans who spoke out against what Trump did and the violence of January 6 ended (later) supporting him. The proof is that he managed to continue dominating the game.”
Milei, despite winning the primaries in August, alleged fraud, and stated, without presenting evidence, that his opponents had stolen his votes. An Argentine newspaper compared the strategy to that of Trump and Bolsonaro.
Authorities of the electoral system criticized the attitude and affirmed that the Argentine voting procedure is “reliable.”
Free market and support of the main economic sectors
Milei has stated that The State “is simply an obstacle” and defends market freedom. He says he believes business owners will be more prosperous and there will be less corruption if trade negotiations, even with other countries, do not include state presence.
The almost absence of the State defended by Milei differentiates it from the “Trump protectionism” and Jair Bolsonaro’s position when he was in charge of Brazil.
“Bolsonaro wanted a powerful state that promoted conservative reforms. It was neoliberal in some things, but also very conservative and protectionist in others,” says Navia, from New York University.
“Trump wanted a protectionist state. They differ in a series of dimensions that are very important in public policies.”
The Argentinian does not have the explicit support of the country’s business sectorswho fear both the implementation of their proposals, the dollarization of the economy and what will happen to relations with Brazil and China, countries they criticize.
In a speech to businessmen, Milei stated that he would put an end to public works and was timidly applauded.
According to the Argentine analyst Rosendo Fraga, the business community preferred Sergio Massa because I already knew him. During the campaign, Milei refused to meet with the Argentine Industrial Union.
The expert assesses, however, that the “resistance” of the business community and the financial market will be softened.
The Argentinian received the support of former president Mauricio Macri (2015-2019), well considered by large economic sectors.
“The market resists Milei because it does not control it nor does it allow itself to be controlled by them,” says Fraga.
Milei has, however, the support of sectors such as technology companies and even the oil sector, which are dissatisfied with Massa’s economic policy.
The great expectation is that Milei will announce a reliable Minister of Economy, to reduce mistrust.
This was the strategy used by Jair Bolsonaro in Brazil, whose pillar of his first campaign was the liberal Paulo Guedes, announced as his economic czar.
The former Brazilian Minister of Economy already enjoyed a good reputation in the market and obtained majority support in the financial system and in important business sectors.
Military and dictatorship
Milei and Bolsonaro also have points of contact in their relationship with the past military regimes of both countries, a reality without parallel with Trump’s United States.
A retired Army captain, Bolsonaro made the claim of the Brazilian dictatorship (1964-1985) a campaign banner, defending his supposed economic advances and rejecting accusations of human rights violations that occurred during the period.
Milei brought the issue to the Argentine campaign in an unprecedented way since the return to democracy in 1983.
In two debates, the Argentine questioned the total number of victims of the country’s dictatorship, alleging that they were not the 30,000 reported by human rights organizations.
The analysts interviewed understand that Milei follows the agenda of her vice presidential candidate, Victoria Villarruel, who has said that she intends to review the compensation paid by the State to the victims of the dictatorship military (1976-1983).
The duo also proposes establishing compensation for the victims of leftist guerrilla attacks and In the 70s.
This week, Villarruel once again stated that the former torture center of the Argentine Navy, ESMA, now called Space of Memory and Human Rights, It should be dismantled and transformed into schools.
The site was declared a UNESCO World Heritage Site in September.
In Argentina, unlike Brazil, The leaders of the dictatorial regime were tried in the 80s.
Since 1983, the military has not had a determining influence on the country’s politics.
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