Argentine President Javier Milei congratulated President-elect Donald Trump on Wednesday following his electoral victory against Vice President Kamala Harris, sharing art depicting Trump as a friend of Argentina and vowing to work towards improving the bilateral relationship.
Former President Trump is believed to have won the 2024 American presidential election as of Wednesday morning, securing the 270 electoral points necessary to win the election. Trump becomes the second American president to win a non-consecutive second term in the White House after Grover Cleveland, who served from 1885 to 1889 and 1893 to 1897.
Milei has been one of the world’s most vocal heads of state supporting Trump since he won his own presidential election in 2023. A libertarian economist by profession, Milei rose to prominence in his country with effusive condemnations of socialism on cable news and built his own political party, Liberty Advances, in 2021, initially securing a seat in the Argentine Congress and ultimately defeating socialist Minister of Economy Sergio Massa in the 2023 presidential election.
“Congratulations on your formidable electoral victory,” Milei wrote in a social media message to President-elect Trump.
“Now, Make America Great Again. You know that You can count on Argentina to carry out your task,” he continued. “Success and blessings.”
Milei accompanied the message with a photo of the two hugging each other with the American and Argentine flags in the background.
On Instagram, Milei shared an image that appeared to be artificial intelligence art of Trump embracing a lion, the mascot of the Liberty Advances party. He captioned the image with the slogans of Trump’s and his campaigns: “Make America Great Again” and “Viva La Libertad, Carajo!” (“Long Live Liberty, Damn It!”).
Unlike many high-profile libertarians in the United States, who condemned Trump for allegedly promoting big-government policies, Milei supported Trump from Argentina for years before running for president. On his podcast in 2021, Milei dedicated an episode, no longer available on Youtube, to offering a libertarian defense of Trump, calling anti-Trump libertarians “imbeciles” and “morons.” Milei similarly announced following his election that he would reorient the foreign policy of his country away from rogue states such as China and Iran and prioritize his relationship with the United States and Israel.
Milei and Trump first met in February on the sidelines of the Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) in Maryland, where both addressed the audience.
Trump has been similarly complimentary of Milei.
“The Argentina guy said the greatest guy in the whole world is Donald Trump. He called me right after he won. I had never spoken to him,” Trump told Breitbart News in January. “He called me to thank me,” Trump narrated. “I said, ‘Oh, why do you want to thank me?’ He said, ‘Your policies paved the way for this.’”
“He’s got everything. He called me the night he won the election and he thanked me very much—he thanked me profusely. It’s called ‘Make Argentina Great Again.’ He’s got MAGA hats,” he continued.
Trump also personally thanked Milei for his support in his CPAC speech.
Milei also reached out to Trump following the failed assassination attempt against in in July.
“All my support and solidarity to the president and candidate Donald Trump, victim of a COWARDLY assassination attempt that put at risk his life and those of hundreds of people,” Milei wrote in an extended message on Twitter.
“The desperation of the international left, that today sees how its nefarious ideology is expiring and is willing to destabilize democracies and promote violence to entrench itself in power, is not surprising,” Milei continued. “With panic upon losing at the ballot, they resort to terrorism to impose their retrograde and authoritarian agenda.”
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