The imminent statement of Federico “Fred” Machado before the American justice system set off alarms in the Government and in sectors of local power. The businessman, linked to the aeronautical business and extradited on charges of drug trafficking and money laundering, could provide information to improve his judicial situation, according to sources in the case. This possible turn is worrying in Buenos Aires: his network of contacts in politics and the business world raises the question of who could be exposed if he decides to speak.
NEWS journalist Franco Lindner wrote this a few weeks ago.
November 5, a Wednesday, is the key date that the Government’s main strategists have in their heads, apart, of course, from October 26. That Wednesday the extradition of “Fred” Machado to the United States will finally be completed, where the Justice of that country ordered his arrest for alleged drug trafficking and fraud. Machado, it is known, is the Argentine businessman who financed José Luis Espert with 200 thousand dollars in his 2019 campaign, promised him at least 800 thousand more and lent him his private plane for his proselytizing trips. And he is also the one who, one day before the Supreme Court approved his extradition, gave a note to a Rio Negro journalist, Carolina Fernández, who became known in the last few hours. There he says terrible things like the following: “I send Santiago Caputo a message: ‘I don’t want to go to the United States. If this explodes, I will fund everything. I speak and the country will fall tomorrow’. The response was: ‘Message received.'” He was whitewashing, before the press, that he had had contacts with the highest levels of Javier Milei’s administration to prevent him from being handed over to North American Justice. And that, if that didn’t happen, he was going to sing and “the country would fall.”
What does “Fred” Machado know to launch such extortion and ask libertarians for help? In the interview he also talked about alleged financial aid to Patricia Bullrich’s presidential campaign in 2023 and his alleged links with the governor of Río Negro, Alberto Weretilneck. And he also complained: “Espert should not have denied me. Why did he deny me?” But the one he did not mention, for now, is the President. The nightmare that haunts the Government is that, once deported to the United States, the businessman decides to become a collaborator of the North American Justice Department to improve his procedural situation and advance against the members of the Milista administration. In the New York courts, let us remember, Milei and her sister Karina are already being investigated for the Libra crypto scam. It remains to be seen if President Donald Trump’s protective shield can evade his Argentine friends in these investigations.
But what could Machado commit to Milei if he became repentant? The speculation made in some offices of power – where they know first-hand about the President’s link with Espert – is the following: the bald economist was the one who introduced Milei to politics in the 2021 campaign, in exchange, as he himself privately acknowledges, for a monthly payment. “Because Javier needed the money, that’s why he agreed to get into politics,” they have heard Espert explain. And the question, then, becomes inevitable: Did Milei know the origin of the generous sum that his partner paid him monthly? Was it a plant contributed by “Fred” Machado? And one more gigantic doubt: why is there a damn coincidence that Espert, Milei and Machado share the same lawyer, Francisco Oneto? Isn’t this whole story too obvious and obscene?
A final consideration. In the report in which he launched his extortion, Machado mentions star advisor Santiago Caputo as the recipient of his claims, although clearly, via Oneto, he had a direct line to the President. He probably did this for two reasons. The first: preserve Milei and not play that card prematurely, because it serves as a latent threat. The second reason: Caputo is the one who would have received the complaint from the US government about the inclusion of a politician with alleged drug ties in the main Libertarian electoral ticket, a very sensitive issue for Washington. The one who would have raised the problem with the advisor is Leonardo Scatturice, the lobbyist he hired with SIDE to smooth out the relationship with Trump. Scatturice’s partner is Barry Bennett, a friend and former advisor to the American president, and the architect of the Republicans’ rescue of the libertarians.
According to this logic, Espert not only fell into disgrace due to the pressure of the polls, but also due to a specific request that the North would have transmitted to Caputo.
“Fred” Machado took note of that. And he promises revenge.
