MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency

Milei tells IDB his government's achievements had to overcome a social justice mentality

“There's always some mean-spirited jerk because whoever is doing this knows he's interrupting the talk,” said Milei about a ringing phone during his speech

Argentine President Javier Milei highlighted Friday during his speech at the Inter-American Development Bank (IDB) headquarters in Washington DC that his administration's economic “achievements” had been attained despite the concept of “social justice” wielded under previous governments, which - in his view - is an “aberration.”

 The Libertarian leader also pointed out that when he came to power, Argentina was in a catastrophic state with high poverty and inflation rates. “Argentina was a real catastrophe when we came to power. Argentina was clearly below average,” he said. Thence, his Government chose to come clean so that “products would reappear on the shelves.”

Milei also underscored Argentina's 57% poverty rate in January 2024 when he had just taken office. “When we arrived, inflation was running at more than 1% per day and then it accelerated even more during the second week of December,” he argued.

“So the question is, how did they get to this disaster? Well, the caste model has two elements: the aberrant idea of the socialists that 'where there is a need, a right is born'. Social justice is an aberration from the moral point of view and naturally, as expected, it is going to generate bad results”, he stressed.

He was praised by IDB President Ilan Goldfajn for tackling the South American country's fiscal deficit and implementing effective regulatory reforms.

“President Milei has tackled Argentina's fiscal deficit, a chronic and very difficult challenge that has caused problems for Argentina for generations. He took a large primary deficit of 2.9% of GDP at the end of 2023 and turned it into a surplus of 1.8% at the end of 2024,″ highlighted the Brazilian Goldfajn, who also underscored the Libertarian's ”program of rationalization and simplification of regulations in Argentina,“ which ”has been remarkable, probably with short term but also long term effects.“

”The results are there for all to see. Monthly inflation has fallen to its lowest level in four and a half years, close to 2%. And real activity indicators have been recovering for months: employment, real wages, investment,“ he added.

Milei's speech at the IDB was interrupted by a ringing phone, which irritated him. He referred to the person causing the interruption as a ”bad-born jerk“ and an ”octopus head,“ which earned him applause from attendees who also wondered how or why ”octopus head“ would be some sort of insult. Milei believed his detractors intentionally tried to disrupt his performance like intentional coughers did during the presidential debates in the 2023 campaign.

Milei, nuevamente enojado con los ruidos molestos

Durante su discurso en el BID, el Presidente se quejó de que su celular no paraba de sonar: ”Siempre hay un imbécil mal nacido” pic.twitter.com/ldydtO3jsz

— El Destape (@eldestapeweb) February 21, 2025

After his presentation at the IDB, Milei and the official delegation went to the World Bank (WB). There they were received by its president, Ajay Banga, who will visit Buenos Aires in April.