There is a negotiation underway that until recently was unthinkable: emissaries from Javier Milei’s government and hard-line Kirchnerism sat down to talk about how to fill the two vacancies that the Supreme Court has. The meeting was between Sebastián Amerio, current Secretary of Justice of Milei, and Juan Martín Mena, former number two of the AFI during Cristinismo and last vice minister of Justice of Alberto Fernández.
In the talk, a possible exchange agreement was discussed: the Government would propose Mariano Llorens – president of the Federal Chamber of Comodoro Py – and Kirchnerism would put on the table Anabel Fernández Sagasti, senator from Mendoza and a figure of absolute trust of Cristina Kirchner.
But who are the operators on both sides in charge of the negotiation?
Sebastián Amerio occupies a central place in the structure of Javier Milei’s government. As Secretary of Justice, he is the articulator between the Executive Branch and the judicial system: he translates the political strategies of Santiago Caputo into the institutional language of the courts. With a past in the Supreme Court and well-oiled ties with federal judges and chambermaids, Amerio became the ruling party’s reliable interlocutor with Justice.
On the K side, his interlocutor is Juan Martín Mena, who was vice minister of Justice under Alberto Fernández and previously second in command of the AFI during the presidency of Cristina Kirchner. He is the cadre with the greatest knowledge of the mechanisms of the Judicial Power that preserves Kirchnerism and maintains the key to the Senate for any institutional agreement. It functions as a guarantor of Cristina Kirchner’s strategy in the Courts and as a counterweight against the maneuvers of the ruling party.
