Javier Milei
President of Argentina
Education
- Economics degree (licentiate) - private University of Belgrano
- Master's degrees - Instituto de Desarrollo Económico y Social [es] and the private Torcuato di Tella University
Overview
Javier Gerardo Milei is an Argentine-Italian economist and politician who has served as President of Argentina since 2023. He has taught university courses and written on various aspects of economics and politics and also hosted radio programs on the subject. Milei's views distinguish him within mainstream Argentine politics.
In November 2021, Milei was elected to the Argentine Chamber of Deputies, representing the City of Buenos Aires for La Libertad Avanza. As a national deputy, he limited his legislative activities to voting, focusing instead on critiquing what he sees as Argentina's political elite and its propensity for high government spending. Milei pledged not to raise taxes and donated his national deputy salary through a monthly raffle. He defeated the incumbent economy minister, Sergio Massa, in the second round of the 2023 general election, for the post of president, on a platform that held the ideological dominance of Peronism responsible for the ongoing Argentine monetary crisis.
Milei is known for his flamboyant personality, distinctive personal style, and strong media presence, including his catchphrase "¡Viva la libertad, carajo!". He has been described politically as a right-wing populist and right-wing libertarian who supports laissez-faire economics, aligning specifically with minarchist and anarcho-capitalist principles. Milei has proposed a comprehensive overhaul of the country's fiscal and structural policies. On social issues, he opposes abortion and euthanasia and supports civilian ownership of firearms. He also supports freedom of choice on drug policy, sex work, and same-sex marriage. In foreign policy, he advocates closer relations with the United States, the United Kingdom, and Israel, and supporting Ukraine in response to the Russian invasion of the country.
Early Life
Javier Gerardo Milei was born on 22 October 1970 in Palermo, Buenos Aires, to Norberto Milei and Alicia Lucich. He grew up in the neighborhood of Villa Devoto and later moved to the Sáenz Peña district. Alicia worked as a homemaker, and Norberto was a bus driver who later became a successful businessman.
Milei is of paternal Italian descent, tracing his heritage between the municipalities of Cosenza and Rossano in the Calabria region of Southern Italy. His paternal grandfather, Francesco "Ciccio" Milei, migrated to Argentina from Calabria in 1926. On his maternal side, he is of Croatian and Italian descent; his mother's Italian ancestors came from the municipality of San Severino in the Marche region of Central Italy. Through his Croatian maternal grandfather, Nicolás Mariano Lucich Bosikovic, he is related to Uruguayan television presenter Rodrigo Lussich who stated their ancestors migrated from Croatia and settled throughout Argentina and Uruguay.
Furthermore, Milei revealed in 2024 that his grandfather, who had a great influence in his life, discovered that he was Jewish of matrilineal descent. His maternal grandfather had been a rabbi shortly before his death. His parents, according to Milei, beat and verbally abused him, causing him to not speak to them for a decade; he regarded them as dead. He was supported by his maternal grandmother and his younger sister Karina, with whom he shares a close bond with and whom he calls "the boss".
Javier Milei attended Catholic schools, including the secondary school Cardenal Copello.[4] At school, he was nicknamed el Loco ("the madman") for his outbursts and aggressive rhetoric. In his late teens and early adulthood, Milei sang in the cover band Everest, which mostly played Rolling Stones covers. He also played goalkeeper for the Chacarita Juniors football team until 1989, when Argentina suffered from hyperinflation, and he committed to a career in economics.
The collapse of Argentina's exchange rate led to Milei becoming interested in economics during the early 1980s. Milei studied introductory economics and the law of supply and demand, which he thought seemed at odds with the ongoing hyperinflation; he said he saw people throwing "themselves on top of the merchandise" in a supermarket and began to study economics in more detail to understand it. Milei obtained an economics degree (licentiate) from the private University of Belgrano and two master's degrees from the Instituto de Desarrollo Económico y Social [es] and the private Torcuato di Tella University.
Career
- President of Argentina -
