Milei's 90 Reforms Ignite Argentina Congress in Combative Address

Milei Brands Opposition 'Parasites' as Argentina Launches 90-Reform Economic Overhaul

Argentine President Javier Milei opened the 144th ordinary session of Congress on Sunday with a 90-minute address that veered between policy announcement and political combat, calling opposition lawmakers "thieves," "parasites," and "delinquents" in terms that provoked a shouting match across the chamber floor and left Argentina's already-polarized political system more fractured than it began. The address, carried live on all major networks, was the most confrontational congressional opening in Argentina's post-dictatorship democratic history by the judgment of most political observers.

The substantive content of the address was equally ambitious. Milei announced 90 structural reforms to be introduced over nine months covering the economy, taxation, the criminal code, the electoral system, education, justice, and defense. He promised a "monthly package" of legislation that would "redesign the institutional architecture of the New Argentina" — language that pleased his base and alarmed his critics in equal measure.

The address follows a strong midterm election performance for Milei's La Libertad Avanza party in late 2025, which gave him a larger legislative bloc than he entered government with in December 2023. He now has the votes to pass some legislation without relying on Peronist or Radical civic union support — but not enough for constitutional-level reforms, which require a two-thirds majority in both chambers.

The Economic Reforms: What Milei Is Proposing

The 90 reforms span an extraordinary range. Among the most consequential: a comprehensive overhaul of Argentina's labor code, which Milei has described as the primary obstacle to foreign investment and formal employment creation; a flat-tax proposal that would replace the existing progressive income tax structure; the elimination of several dozen regulatory agencies created during Peronist administrations; and a constitutional amendment to enshrine central bank independence and dollarization as explicit policy goals.

The dollarization proposal is the most politically explosive. Milei campaigned in 2023 on replacing the Argentine peso with the US dollar — a position that earned him international notoriety. His first year in office was consumed by fiscal adjustment and currency stabilization rather than formal dollarization, but the congressional address signaled that he intends to attempt the structural measure in his second legislative year. Economists are deeply divided about the feasibility and desirability of the move in Argentina's current fiscal position.

According to Dr. Marina Dal Poggetto, director of the Buenos Aires-based economic research firm EcoGo, "The 90 reforms are not all equal in their implications. The labor code changes and regulatory elimination are achievable through legislation Milei now has votes for. The constitutional changes, including dollarization, are an entirely different matter politically. What we are watching is a president using his rhetorical aggression to make his maximalist agenda seem continuous with his achievable one — and hoping that momentum carries him further than the arithmetic actually allows."

The Opposition's Response and the Stakes for Argentina's Democracy

The opposition Peronist bloc walked out of the chamber during the most inflammatory portion of Milei's address, a gesture of contempt that was itself politically calculated — it generated front-page coverage while denying Milei the spectacle of legislators sitting passively while being called parasites. The Radical Civic Union, whose support Milei needed for several of his first-year reforms, issued a carefully worded statement expressing concern about the "tone and content" of the address without committing to oppose the reform agenda.

The international dimension of Milei's political project continued to attract attention. His government has deepened its alignment with Trump's United States to a degree unprecedented in Argentine diplomatic history — Milei attended Trump's inauguration, hosted CPAC in Buenos Aires, and publicly aligned with US positions on Venezuela, Cuba, and now Iran. His critics argue that this alignment, while generating short-term political benefits, has damaged Argentina's standing with the broader international community, including within the region where Buenos Aires has historically exercised significant diplomatic weight. Whether 90 reforms can pass through a parliament where Milei holds a plurality but not a majority is the practical political test that all the rhetorical fireworks cannot substitute for.

The Economic Collapse Backdrop and Milei's Political Survival

Milei's combative style functions as a political strategy as well as a personal temperament. By branding the opposition as criminals, he frames any resistance to his reform agenda as the self-interested obstruction of an entrenched corrupt elite — rather than as legitimate democratic disagreement about policy. That framing has served him well with his base, but it has made coalition-building with potential legislative allies difficult and has generated international concern about the quality of democratic deliberation in Argentina under his government.

The economic results of his first two years in office provide the strongest argument in his favor. Inflation, which stood at over 200 percent annually when he took office in December 2023, had fallen to approximately 30 percent by late 2025 — still high by international standards, but dramatically lower, and achieved through fiscal adjustment that most economists regarded as more aggressive than what Argentina's economy could sustain. Whether those gains hold, and whether they translate into sufficient living standard improvements to maintain his political support, is the central question of his second legislative year.

The 90 reforms announced Sunday cover an extraordinary breadth of Argentine governance. Their success will depend not on Milei's rhetorical aggression but on whether his legislative bloc — larger than it was but still short of a majority for constitutional changes — can be assembled into a functional governing coalition for specific measures. The experience of Argentina's previous structural reformers suggests that reform fatigue and political resistance accumulate faster than reformers expect. Milei begins his reform agenda with energy and ambition. Whether he has the political patience and institutional skill to see it through to completion is the question that October 2026, when the presidential race officially opens, will force him to answer.