The Government has just confirmed what was an open secret: that José Luis Espert, friend and ally of the president, will be the first candidate for deputy for Freedom advances in the October elections. But behind that announcement there is a story that the protagonists prefer to forget. It is that there was a time, not so distant, in which Javier Milei spoke plagues of his head of the list. If he even accused him of having offered him a coima. In “El Loco”, the unauthorized biography of the first president, the journalist Juan Luis González points out that Milei “told the anecdote a dozen times, not only in confidence but, on some occasions, even in events and television sets.”
It happened in mid -2021, shortly after Milei agreed to join Espert in the economist’s space, Libertad progresses. In that alchemy, Espert would go as a candidate in the province in those legislative and Milei would do so in Buenos Aires territory. But one afternoon, according to the story of the libertarian leader, they found themselves in a coffee and Espert asked him to go down his candidacy. He had grown too much in the surveys and bit votes to the PRO by Horacio Rodríguez Larreta, a strategic ally of the bald economist. Milei said that the other tempted him with a suitcase full of money he left on the table: there were 300 thousand dollars, he said, in exchange for accepting to get off. He rejected them.
Alejandro Fantino himself, without making names, told him the scene in an interview:
“I was the silver above the table.” And you see the thousands of dollars there and you have to decide. They wanted me to run …
Fantino re -asked until he took out his figure.
Consulted by the episode, near History. They say that the silver that the economist offered to Milei was actually the monthly payment that he paid him for having him in his space, and that he did not even remotely approached the aforementioned figure. Who to believe?
The rest is known history. After that question, Milei and Espert broke. The libertarian was the same as a candidate and made a good choice in capital: he took 17 points that positioned him as a third force in the district and gave him the thrust for everything that came later. It was the debut of his current seal because, after hitting the door in Avanza Libertad, the candidate created … La Libertad advances. Another flagrant plagiarism among the many that accumulates.
As both in the background are pragmatic people, their paths crossed again when they agreed, after Milei arrived at the presidency. The discussion about who leads and who accompanies, the other was put at his service. In January 2024, Milei received it at Casa Rosada, offered the Budget and Finance Commission in Deputies and the future candidacy in exchange for its incorporation into space. They ended up hugging and jumping, in a small improvised pogo like the one seen at this time between the president and Cristian Ritondo.
The past, torn. For Milei, Espert is no longer a coimero, but the best candidate.
By Franco Lindner
