MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency

Milei defends his vetoing Congress' “noble causes”

“If you want to go back, you will have to carry me out feet first,” Milei underlined

Argentine President Javier Milei explained in his broadcast message Friday evening that he vetoed laws recently passed by Congress to raise pensions and disability allowances because they would have increased spending, leading to either printing money or increasing taxes to avoid destroying the fiscal surplus.

The head of State announced a decree to prevent the Treasury from borrowing from the Central Bank and a bill to Congress to be sent shortly to criminalize the approval of national budgets that incur a fiscal deficit.

Milei contended that his government has “lifted 10 million people out of poverty” and emphasized that “you cannot fix in two years what was destroyed in almost a century.”

He also warned Congress that he would veto laws that would increase university funding and support for Garrahan Hospital.

“In the last month, Congress pushed through a set of laws aimed at destroying the fiscal surplus. Using noble causes as excuses, they enact laws that lead the national government to bankruptcy,” Milei argued.

“It would be easy to go along with any initiative, as previous presidents did, but my job is not to do what is convenient for me in terms of power,” he added while noting that the recent laws represented “an annualized expenditure of practically 2.5% of GDP,” which “would imply an increase in public spending equivalent to one YPF per year or, in other words, it would imply additional debt of more than US$300 billion, or a 70% increase in the national debt.”

“Congress has doubled down its efforts at sabotage and destruction because they are aware that every step we take forward makes it more difficult for them to return to power,” he also pointed out.

“Before giving Argentines false hopes, we chose to be frank in telling them how hard the road would be and to be firm in traveling it, understanding that nothing valuable in life happens overnight,” the President insisted. “My goal is to do good, even if it means being accused of doing evil,” because “we came to fix the economy at its roots.”

“Using noble causes,” Congress passes “laws that are bankrupting the nation,” he said, adding that “there is no money” to finance the initiatives promoted by the opposition, whose members should “earn an honest living in the private sector,” were they not milking the State since forever.

“We are not going to go back, we are not going to return to the past, we are not going to return to the path of decline. And to Congress, I say: if you want to go back, you will have to carry me out feet first,” Milei underlined.