The past returns again and again, even in times of artificial intelligence and blitzkrieg campaigns. A few days ago, Twitter user Javier Smaldone (@mis2centavos) shared an image that went viral: a photo from the 90s in which young Diego Santilli and Sergio Massa are seen together in a basic unit of the Justicialista Party, in what appears to be an event.
The discovery revived the “Peronist” past of the current deputy of La Libertad Avanza, a detail that many users did not miss. Between ironies and memes, the postcard became a symbol of the ideological turns that marked the career of Santilli, today an ally of Javier Milei but formed under the sign of Menemism.
Son of Hugo Santilli, a businessman and Justicialist leader who presided over River and Banco Nación during the presidency of Carlos Menem, Diego Santilli grew up surrounded by politics and power. In the early years of the 90s he was a member of the Buenos Aires Peronist Youth, where he coincided with other young people such as Cristian Ritondo and Mariano Mera Figueroa. At that time, the PJ of the Capital was dominated by figures such as Carlos Grosso and Miguel Ángel Toma, and Santilli began to weave his first networks in what many describe as his “Peronist DNA.”
Although his time in Justicialism was brief—until the mid-90s—it served as a school of political pragmatism. He then joined Compromiso para el Cambio and later the PRO, where he was a Buenos Aires legislator, manager of Banco Ciudad, Minister of Security and deputy head of Government under Horacio Rodríguez Larreta.
Today, incorporated into the libertarian space after the agreement between the PRO and La Libertad Avanza, Santilli is once again a trend for an image that connects him with his starting point: the old Peronist “caste.” An irony of destiny for a leader who, in the campaign, presents himself as part of change and renewal.
