The growing tension between Patricia Bullrich and Victoria Villarruel added an unexpected chapter in Congress. The vice president decided to give the Minister of Security a bottle of wine, a gesture that on the surface seemed cordial, but which was read as a charge and which within the ruling party is seen as part of the “cold war” that both have been maintaining for weeks.
Bullrich had previously sent his counterpart in the Senate a copy of the National Constitution, in direct reference to the libertarian sectors that criticized Villarruel for the already known internal disputes and his bad relationship with President Milei. That gesture, which mixed a legal warning and a political message, was responded to by Villarruel with irony: a bottle of wine delivered to his office in the Senate, as revealed by the media La Política Online.
The relationship between the two reached a point of coldness that surprised even members of La Libertad Avanza. Villarruel, who is trying to consolidate his own space of power in the Upper House, was at the center of criticism from the harshest sectors of Mileism. Bullrich, meanwhile, seeks to maintain authority within the cabinet and prevent the libertarian internal party from eroding it politically.
The gift exchange inevitably activated social networks. Users revived memes and old rumors around Bullrich, especially those linked to the episode she starred in in 2009, when she was a member of the Civic Coalition. At that time, he tested positive for alcohol and his car was seized, according to what the media reconstructed at that time. Bullrich denied having drunk excessively: “I had practically not drunk anything. I was coming from an event with a dinner at Vicente López. There was a fairly poor quality wine, so I hardly drank; I drank a lot of Coca-Cola. If I get a positive and another negative with the same machine, we will have to see if it is a problem with me or with the mechanism,” he said then.
The exchange of gifts exposed an internal situation that is already open within the ruling party. The tension between Villarruel and Bullrich was not deactivated and both gestures remained a sign of a relationship crossed by reproaches and mistrust. Everything indicates that the conflict will continue to escalate when the minister arrives in the upper house.
