Buenos Aires Agenda: Charging Foreigners for Health and Education, and Seeking Life Imprisonment for Police Killers

While the main right-wing candidate in Buenos Aires province is focused on governance and has already scheduled new meetings with governors to achieve the parliamentary goals set by Javier and Karina Milei, in the country’s most populous district, part of the agenda that will shape 2027 has begun to unfold: fee-based education and health for foreigners, promoted by La Libertad Avanza, and a pro-security and law enforcement discourse from the PRO. All this while, at the national level, the government faces difficulties in advancing key projects such as the Inviolability of Private Property and the elimination of primary elections (PASO).

Cristian Ritondo, president of the Buenos Aires PRO, used his social media to share two news stories reflecting the deaths of two police officers in «just two days in the province.» The message directed at Axel Kicillof and his succession was clear: «This can’t go on.» For the deputy, «whoever kills a police officer must get life imprisonment.» It is an initiative he has championed since serving as Security Minister under María Eugenia Vidal and continues to push as a legislator. «To every police officer, know that you are not alone. My respect, my support, and my commitment are always with you,» he said.

Almost simultaneously, Agustín Romo, delegate of Las Fuerzas del Cielo in the district, introduced a bill in the local legislature, backed by his caucus colleagues, to charge foreigners without permanent residency for public health and university education, while maintaining free care for emergencies, vaccinations, or communicable diseases. An initiative that arose, as he shared on social media, from identifying «foreigners who live in Argentina, study for free in Argentina, receive free care in Argentine hospitals while hating Argentina,» as expressed during the World Cup.

A local agenda unfolding amid defining national discussions still in the works. Ritondo was at La Rural on Tuesday, where he had lunch at the El Central restaurant with representatives from various agricultural entities, ambassadors, and journalists. Withholding taxes, the so-far failed Inviolability project, and the country’s electoral future were the most pointed questions that marked the meeting, as politics begins to stir after the soccer World Cup.

The Private Inviolability project receives particular attention from the PRO regarding the section on express evictions or, as Ritondo defined them, «immediate» evictions in cases of «usurpations.» A section that the macrismo adopts as its own suggestion and for which they «have high hopes.» For the yellow party, this text is one of the priorities on its agenda, but due to the lack of necessary agreements to advance and the failure for the fourth consecutive time, there have already been more than a dozen drafts, and they need to «see how it comes from the Senate» to adopt a clear position in the Chamber of Deputies. Patricia Bullrich’s difficult mission is to bring positions closer through concessions, even if the Executive Branch does not like them because, as is already known, once initiatives enter the Upper House, the decision is hers.

In that same chamber, the government is trying to advance electoral reform that includes, among other points, the elimination of primary elections (PASO). An initiative that the ruling party still cannot guarantee with votes, but Javier Milei has again insisted on its abolition. For him, it is a tool created by politics to solve political problems and should no longer exist. For the PRO, the priority within that broad reform is not the primaries.

The PRO has no official position on the issue. There has been no official discussion with the government, and for the party, as Ritondo himself told journalists, the reform is «much bigger than discussing PASO yes or PASO no,» whether they should be mandatory or not, or whether there should be collective candidacies or not. Until there is a «serious meeting» with the Casa Rosada on this matter, the party will not present a comprehensive stance, although it did highlight positive points of the project such as the digitalization of membership forms, while emphasizing the need to rediscuss the elimination of advertising space and campaign financing, as it would directly affect parties without resources.