Argentina

In the late 1800s and early 1900s, large numbers of Italian, Spanish, and German immigrants brought with them fascism and antisemitism, difficulties that persist in Argentina to the present day. In the past two centuries, the far right in Argentina has evolved from early nationalist and fascist movements often aligned with autocratic governments to a more contemporary far-right populist political force. The far right’s influence has varied over the decades, often aligning with periods of military rule, political instability, or economic crisis. Today, the far right, particularly anti-LGBTQ+, racist, and antisemitic movements, continue to play a significant role in Argentine politics, reflecting broader global trends of rising nationalism and far-right populism.

Race in Colonial Argentina

Spaniards arrived in Argentina in the early 1500s, establishing a permanent colony on the site of Buenos Aires in 1580. Argentina was considered a relative backwater in the Spanish Empire initially, consigned to the territory of the Viceroyalty of Peru, which was rich in precious metals and far more important to the Crown. It wasn’t until 1776 that the Viceroyalty of Rio de la Plata was created, and Buenos Aires became a flourishing port. The Viceroyalty consisted of modern-day Uruguay, southern Bolivia, Paraguay, and Argentina—with Buenos Aires as its capital. 

During the Spanish colonial period, racial hierarchies placed Europeans at the top of the social ladder, followed by mixed-race individuals, Indigenous people, and Black people. The colonial caste system reinforced racial divisions and discrimination. The system was hierarchical by race, but also by place of birth, ranging from pureblood Spaniards, to Latin American-born Spanish descendants, to various “mixed” racial identities with Indigenous or Black parentage. “Whiteness” as a concept was embedded in the system, with pureblood “white” Spaniards at the top. Indigenous populations were often marginalized, subjected to forced labor, and displaced from their lands. Violence against the Indigenous population lasted for centuries. Black people from Africa were brought to Argentina and enslaved.

It is notable that antisemitism in Argentina has been a problem since Spanish colonization, Spanish rulers Isabel and Ferdinand having infamously banished Jews from Spain in 1492 and has continued to be a significant problem to the present day. In the 1900s, antisemitism was inflamed by rising European fascist movements in Italy and Germany, which coursed through Argentine immigrant communities.

Argentina’s influx of African enslaved people began in 1588. The slave trade flourished through the port of Buenos Aires, and enslaved people were forced to work in agriculture, livestock, domestic work and made up a substantial portion of the population in certain regions. The Buenos Aires neighborhoods of San Telmo and Monserrat housed a large quantity of enslaved people, although most were sent to the interior provinces. The 1778 census showed very high concentrations of Black people in cities located in regions where agricultural production predominated. 

Racial Hierarchy After Independence

After Argentina gained independence from Spain in 1816, racial hierarchies persisted. The early nation-building process often involved efforts to promote European immigration while marginalizing Indigenous and Black communities. There was a prevailing belief among Argentine elites in the superiority of European descent, which influenced policies and societal attitudes. Peninsular Spaniards (“white” people born in Spain), who until independence held all political control and oversaw Spanish colonial administration, were replaced by criollos (meaning “white” people born to Spaniards in Latin America) politically. While there was some mixing between the criollo population, Indigenous people, and the enslaved population, and with other European immigrants, the racial hierarchy and discrimination remained intact. 

Criollos continued enslaving Africans, while also murdering, displacing, and seizing the land of Indigenous people. Slavery was abolished in the 1860 Constitution, but racism remained. According to Article 25, Argentina was to specifically promote European immigration, which the criollo elites viewed as superior, a constitutional stipulation that would long remain. 

In the late 19th and early 20th centuries, the Argentine government actively promoted the idea of a “white Argentina.” This ideology was part of a broader policy to encourage European immigration, which was seen to “civilize” and develop the country. This policy was based on the belief that European immigrants were racially superior and would help modernize and uplift Argentine society. This pro-European posture would be fundamental to Argentina’s development as later, immigrants, mostly Europeans who arrived during the migration waves of the late 19th and early 20th centuries, found their place in this society without altering the racial stratification Argentina inherited from colonial times. Populations with African, Indigenous, or mixed heritage, continued to be relegated to the bottom of society and excluded from national narratives of who mattered in Argentina. 

That said, there was a quite different take on racial mixing in Argentina. The deeply popular racist belief that white people, especially Europeans, were the only ones capable of carrying on civilization, while most non-whites were inevitably related to barbarism, was widespread. But unlike other regions of the Americas where there was a violent segregation of non-whites to prevent racial mixing, Argentina’s elite thought the non-white population could be improved if they were to mix with whites. Argentine governments of the time wanted the non-white population to become “diluted” within the white majority through racial mixture. In 1905, journalist Juan José de Soiza Reilly captured this idea in his article, “People of Color,” (Gente de color) writing that, “Little by little, this race is becoming extinct… The race is losing its primitive color in the mixture. It becomes gray. It dissolves. It lightens. The African tree is producing white Caucasian flowers.” In 1887, the official percentage of the Black population was about two percent. From then on, racial categories were not registered in the census. 

This era also saw horrific treatment of Indigenous people. In the 1870s and 1880s, the brutal Conquest of the Desert was waged by the Argentine military against Indigenous people. It was essentially a “pacification campaign” aimed to establish dominance over Indigenous people in Patagonia and the southern regions. This campaign led to displacement, assimilation, and a significant reduction in the Indigenous population. The Argentine government and society largely ignored or marginalized Indigenous cultures and people during this period. African Argentines faced significant discrimination. During the early 20th century, it was common to overlook or erase the contributions and presence of African Argentines.

A true geographical unification of Argentina would take decades. What now constitutes modern Argentina was frequently disunited until 1860, when its first constitution was passed. 1861 marks the date when the state of Buenos Aires finally integrated into the rest of the Argentine Confederation to form a united country. Even so, power struggles between Buenos Aires and the provinces prevented a truly united nation until 1880, and even then, uprisings and conflict between regions were common. 

In the late 1800s, Argentina began a decades-long period of liberal economic and open door–for Europeans–immigration policies that led to rapid income and population growth. Between 1869 and World War I, the population quadrupled with an influx of millions of European immigrants.  By 1908, Argentina was an economic powerhouse and a force in international trade, with the seventh highest per capita income in the world. Between the 1850s and the 1950s, three and a half million Italians immigrated to Argentina. It is estimated today that at least 25 million Argentines (about 62 percent of the country’s population) have some degree of Italian ancestry. Argentina has the second-largest community of Italians outside of Italy, after Brazil. Substantial numbers of Spaniards and Germans also came to Argentina. Unlike Mexico and other South American countries, Argentina has fewer Indigenous people and thus did not create a national identity based on a mestizo population, and the population is 95 percent people of European descent. In 1912, full adult male suffrage was instituted but a tumultuous century of political chaos between far-left and far-right governments was to come, along with rising fascist movements and precipitous economic decline. 

This period also saw growing antisemitism in Argentina. Mass immigration in the late nineteenth century brought a substantial number of Germans and Jews to Argentina. This mass immigration brought with it a nativist fervor, which, in combination with the growth of Nazism amongst German Argentines, spawned policy measures against Jews. 

In 1902, Argentina passed a Residency Law limiting the number of Jewish immigrants, and newspapers like La Nacion incorporated antisemitic rhetoric. In German Argentine communities, propaganda against Jews circulated in newspapers, and visits by Jews, even Albert Einstein, were rejected. Then there were the antisemitic conspiracy theories, like the “Plan Andinia,” which began spreading in the early 1900s, alleging that there were plans to establish a Jewish state by force in parts of Argentina and Chile. This conspiracy has been used for decades in far-right circles to attack Jews and Jewish institutions. Decades later, in 1971, a leaflet, Plan Andinia, appeared among officers in the Argentine army accusing international Jewry and Zionists of planning to take over southern parts of the country. During the 1976–1983 military dictatorship, some Jewish prisoners of the armed forces were tortured for information about the Andinia plan and were asked to provide details regarding the alleged preparations of the Israel Defense Forces for the invasion of Patagonia.

Argentine Fascism

The influence of fascist ideologies in Argentina began to manifest in the 1920s, inspired by European movements and backed by Argentina’s many immigrants from countries where fascism was on the rise. Benito Mussolini’s Fascist Party and Adolf Hitler’s Nazi Party provided a model for local nationalist and authoritarian groups. Argentine intellectuals and political activists who admired these regimes began to advocate for their ideas.

The Argentine Patriotic League (Liga Patriótica Argentina) was a nationalist paramilitary group established in Buenos Aires in 1919, led by Manuel Carlés, a professor at the top military training school (Escuela Superior de Guerra). This period also saw violent antisemitic acts. In 1919, during what came to be known as the Tragic Week (Semana Trágica), there were brutal attacks against Jewish communities. The Argentine police went into Jewish neighborhoods, dragged Jews from their homes, and beat, shot, and killed them for supposedly spreading subversive ideas like communism and socialism. The League was merged into the Argentine Civic Legion in 1931 and formed part of a larger movement of patriotic leagues active in Chile and Argentina during the early 20th century. They were known for assaulting workers and violently attacking their neighborhoods, including the Jewish Once (also called Balvanera) neighborhood of Buenos Aires. 

Adherents were trained by members of the armed forces, and the movement was subsidized by important members of the oligarchy and supported by the Catholic Church. The League worked together with Buenos Aires police in the repression of social movements. The group spread across Argentina, pushing a nationalist, xenophobic, anti-communist and antisemitic belief system. They attacked in particular Catalan immigrants (accused of being anarchists) and Jews (accused of being Bolsheviks).  At its height in the early 1920s, the League’s so-called brigades contained as many as 300,000 members throughout the country. The League participated in the events known as Patagonia Trágica (Patagonian Tragedy, 1920–1922), in Río Gallegos, where 1,500 striking workers were assassinated. It also participated in José Félix Uriburu’s 1930 military coup.

In the 1930s, antisemitism in Argentina became a prominent ideology and turned markedly more Argentinian. Uriburu’s coup was central to this shift. He trained in the German military in 1908 and was named the director of the Center of German influence in the Argentine army in 1910. He installed a German military presence in the army and filled his government with far-right hardliners later involved in antisemitic attacks in the post-World War II era.

Alongside Uriburu, in 1931, the Argentine Country-Group (ACG) of the German Socialist Workers’ Party (NSDAP) was formed. Later that year, the ACG featured swastikas in newspapers, gave strong-armed Hitler salutes at rallies, and were identified by the Argentine authorities for assaulting suspected Jews. Unlike its neighbor to the North, Brazil, where the Nazi party was shut down for its potential to challenge the regime, Nazism was a real force in Argentina in the 1930s.

Figures in the Catholic Church also played an important role in pushing antisemitism during this era. Priests such as Gustavo Franceschi, director of the Catholic journal Criterio, and Leonardo Castellani, floated the idea of pogroms in the country. Explaining why they might be necessary, Father Julio Meinville in his 1936 book El Judio reasoned that Jews, whom he equated with the antichrist, were promoting sin among Catholic Argentines. On the radio, in pamphlets, and in articles in Clarinada, Father Virgilio Fillipo dehumanized Jews with horrific stereotypical depictions including hooked noses and wavy hair. In these Catholic circles, Jews were blamed for controlling society, greediness, and attacking the family and religion. They were especially singled out as subversives importing Marxism, Freudianism, and sexual promiscuity and perversion into the country. In line with official Catholic dogma of that era, Jews were often depicted as responsible for killing Christ.

The 1930s saw even more fascist organizing. The Argentine Fascist Party (Partido Fascista Argentino) was established in 1932 and disbanded in 1936, when it was replaced with the National Fascist Union (Union Nacional Fascista, UNF). Founded in the early 1930s, the UNF was one of the first such organized movements in the country. This group, which included many former military officers, sought to implement a totalitarian state with a strong emphasis on nationalism, anti-communism, and economic corporatism. Founded by Italian Argentines, it was based on Italian fascism and was recognized by Mussolini‘s Fascist Party in 1935. In the 1930s the party became a mass movement, particularly in the Córdoba region. 

Argentine Nationalist Action, later renamed Affirmation of a New Argentina, was a nationalist and fascist political party in Argentina that existed between 1932 and 1936. It was founded by Juan P. Ramos, who was openly antisemitic and pro-Nazi, and financially supported by the German Embassy in Argentina. The Argentine Nationalist Action declared some support for Uriburu and his government, and went through a series of name changes until 1935, when the Nationalist Youth Alliance allied itself with the Argentine Fascist Party and the Labor Nationalism Party to form the Córdoba Fascist Forces Front, which was replaced by the Fascist National Union in 1936.

Due to the numbers of German immigrants who lived in the country, and the popularity of fascist movements, Argentina maintained close ties with Germany and remained neutral for much of World War II. Argentina eventually gave in to the Allies’ pressure, and broke relations with the Axis powers very late, on January 26, 1944, only declaring war against the Axis on March 27, 1945, less than two months before VE Day. Today, German traditions live on in many Argentine provinces, especially in Córdoba, Entre Ríos, Buenos Aires, Misiones, and La Pampa. 

The Far Right Under Perón

While Juan Domingo Perón’s government (1946-1955; 1973-74) was primarily populist rather than explicitly fascist, it exhibited some far-right tendencies, including nationalism and authoritarianism. Perón’s regime incorporated elements of fascist corporatism and sought to create a centralized, paternalistic state. His political style, characterized by charismatic leadership and a strong focus on national identity, drew some parallels to fascist regimes. Perón was known to have admired Mussolini and Italian fascism, and some aspects of his policies and rhetoric reflected this influence. 

Perón’s version of nationalism was more pro-worker than European fascism. In his earlier terms in office, Perón’s government invested heavily in public works, expanded social welfare, and forced employers to improve working conditions. Trade unions grew rapidly with his support and women’s suffrage was granted, largely due to his popular wife Eva’s influence. His government was also known to employ dictatorial tactics; several dissidents were fired, exiled, or arrested, and much of the press was closely controlled. Several high-profile fascist World War II war criminals, including German Nazis Josef Mengele and Adolf Eichmann, and Croatian Ustaše leader Ante Pavelić, relocated to Argentina during this time. It is reported that hundreds, if not thousands, of former Nazis were given refuge in the country, and Argentina long rejected efforts at extradition for those accused of war crimes. Years later, after a return to democracy in 1997, the country finally established a commission to investigate Nazi activities and Argentina’s role as a refuge for Nazis and their personal or stolen wealth.

The role of antisemitism under Perón is hotly debated. Prior to his administration, Argentine Foreign Minister Jose Cantilo issued Directive Eleven in 1938 barring Jewish immigration to Argentina. This directive remained in place under Perón. Santiago Peralta, an Argentine Nazi, was appointed by Perón as head of immigration and subsequently put in charge of enforcing Directive Eleven. Peralta published two books detailing his antisemitism. The Action of the Jewish People in Argentina pushed the idea that Jews were dominating the country, and The Influence of the Arab People in Argentina likened the Jewish relationship to society as to that of cysts in the human body.

When Perón was elected president in 1946, he reinstated Peralta as the head of immigration. Peralta worked to keep Jews out of the country. In 1946, when the S.S. Jamaica docked in Argentina with 70 Jewish passengers, Peralta refused to let them ashore. The Jewish community appealed directly to Perón, who claimed he would investigate, but he didn’t, and the ship left. A year later, a similar situation occurred. This time, Perón let the Jews ashore over Peralta’s objections. But his motives may have been less than pure; Perón had created the Argentine-Israelite Organization, which granted special privileges to Jews who were willing to pledge their loyalty to him. This era also saw Perón provide a haven for prominent Nazis and Nazi-allied war criminals in Argentina.

In the decades before the 1976 coup, the Argentine military, supported by the Argentine establishment, opposed Perón‘s populist government, particularly its pro-worker policies, and attempted a coup in 1951 before succeeding in 1955. After taking control, the armed forces proscribed Peronism, a decision that triggered the organization of Peronist resistance in workplaces and trade unions, as the working classes sought to protect the economic and social advancements secured by Perón. Over time, democratic rule was partially restored but promises of legalizing free expression and political liberties were not kept. Pro-Peronist and left-wing guerrilla groups arose in the 1960s, namely Uturuncos and the People’s Guerrilla Army, challenging these developments at times with violence.

After Perón was deposed in 1955, a pair of antisemitic paramilitary groups flourished in the regimes that came after. One of these groups, the Tacuara, viewed themselves as heirs to the fascism of interwar Germany. They advocated Jewish extermination, bombings, firearms assaults on buildings housing Jews, executing Jewish university students, and engaging in physical harassment of Jews, including carving a swastika into the breast of a Jewish university student. The Tacuara also sought to imitate fascist Germany with Nazi-like propaganda including “Jews to the Crematorium! Honor to Eichmann.” Many Tacuara had links to the American Ku Klux Klan, and would later become key officials during the 1976 military junta.

After Perón returned from exile in 1973, the Ezeiza massacre marked the end of the unsteady alliance that had long existed between left-wing, meaning predominantly workers and students, and right-wing factions of Peronism. Peronist masses, some three and a half million, mainly young people, had gathered at the Ezeiza airport access to celebrate Perón’s return from an 18-year exile in Spain. Perón was accompanied on his plane by Héctor Cámpora, a representative of Peronism’s left-wing. From Perón’s speaking platform, camouflaged snipers from the right-wing of Peronism opened fire on the crowd. The left-wing Peronist Youth and the Montoneros, a pro-Perón left-wing political movement inspired by the Cuban Revolution that engaged in violence, were targeted and trapped, and at least 13 people killed and 365 injured. 

In 1974, Perón withdrew his support for the Montoneros shortly before his death. By the time his widow Isabel was president, the Minister of Social Welfare José López Rega had already organized the far-right death squad known as the Argentine Anticommunist Alliance (AAA, or Triple A), which would play a key role during the Dirty War. In 1975, Isabel Perón and later her replacement Ítalo Lúder signed decrees empowering the military and the police to “annihilate” left-wing “subversive elements.”

The Dirty War (1974-1983)

The Dirty War (Guerra sucia) took place under a military junta or the “civic-military” dictatorship of Argentina (dictadura cívico-militar de Argentina) that ran the country using state-directed terrorism from 1974 to 1983. Central to its activities was Operation Condor, under which military and security forces and death squads in the form of the Argentine Anticommunist Alliance (AAA, or Triple A) hunted down political dissidents and anyone believed to be associated with socialism, left-wing Peronism, or the Montoneros movement.  Many Triple A members were former Tacuara. The group later started a magazine for their propaganda called El Caudillo, which had been subsidized by Perón’s and his wife’s administrations in the early 1970s.

It is estimated that between 22,000 and 30,000 people were killed or disappeared, many of whom were never identified. In one of the more despicable aspects of the Dirty War, children were taken from murdered dissidents and then raised by members of the regime. 

The primary target, like in many other South American countries participating in Operation Condor, were communist guerrillas and sympathizers, but victims of the regime also included students, militants, trade unionists, writers, journalists, artists, and any citizens suspected of being left-wing activists. The disappeared included those who were thought to be a political or ideological threat to the junta, even vaguely, or those seen as antithetical to the regime and its policies. According to human rights organizations in Argentina, between 1,900 and 3,000 Jews were among the 30,000 who were targeted by the Argentine military junta. That is a disproportionate number, as Jews comprised between five and 12 percent of those targeted, but only made up about one percent of the population. All were killed in an attempt by the junta to silence social and political opposition.

For the purposes of eradicating Argentina’s “internal enemies,” the junta set up concentration camps for all enemies of the state, mostly consisting of non-Jews but also including hundreds to thousands of Jews. Testimony from survivors indicates that Jews received Nazi-like treatment and were tortured. Some were forced to mime dogs or cats by crawling on their hands and knees and licking the bottom of officers’ boots. Some had swastikas carved into their bodies, were used as practice for martial arts, were forced to salute Hitler or to listen to recordings of Hitler’s voice. In other cases, Jews had swastikas painted on their bodies and Hitler mustaches on their face, were told they would be turned into soap, or suffered other horrific treatment.

By the 1980s, economic collapse, public discontent, and the disastrous handling of the failed Falklands War by the Argentine military resulted in the end of the junta and the restoration of democracy, effectively ending the Dirty War. Many members of the junta were imprisoned for crimes against humanity and genocide in a fraught, drawn-out process to bring justice to the Dirty War’s victims.

Return to Democracy

The democratic government of President Raúl Alfonsín was elected to office in 1983. Alfonsín organized the National Commission on the Disappearance of Persons (Comisión Nacional sobre la Desaparición de Personas, CONADEP) to investigate crimes committed during the Dirty War, and heard testimony from hundreds of witnesses and began to build cases against offenders. The commission organized a tribunal to conduct a transparent prosecution of offenders, holding the Trial of the Juntas in 1985. Among the nearly 300 people prosecuted, many of the prior regime’s leading officers were charged, convicted, and sentenced for their crimes.

After the return to democracy in 1983, Argentina saw a reduction in far-right influence due to the country’s commitment to human rights and democratic values. However, there were sporadic attempts by far-right groups to gain political traction in the following decades. Organizations like the Nationalist Movement (Movimiento Nacionalista) and various neo-fascist groups maintained a presence but remained on the fringes of mainstream politics.

The Argentine armed forces opposed subjecting more of its personnel to the trials, threatening the civilian leadership with another coup. In 1986, the military forced the passage of the Full Stop Law (Ley de Punto Final) in 1986, which “put a line” under previous actions and ended prosecutions for crimes committed during military rule. Fearing military uprisings, Argentina’s first two presidents after the return of democracy sentenced only the top two Dirty War former commanders. The Punto Final Law stated that military personnel involved in torture were doing their “jobs.” 

In 1994, President Carlos Menem praised the military in their “fight against subversion.” In 2003, Congress repealed the Pardon Laws, and in 2005 the Argentine Supreme Court ruled they were unconstitutional. Under the presidency of Nestor Kirchner (2003-2007), the Argentine government re-opened its investigations into crimes against humanity and genocide in 2006 and began the prosecution of military and security officers. Kirchner’s wife, Cristina, served as president from 2007 to 2015, and then as vice president from 2019 to 2023 under President Alberto Fernández.

The Far Right Today, Emerging Trends

As was the case in Brazil when President Jair Bolsonaro was elected in 2018, Argentina took a turn to the hard right with the 2023 election of President Javier Milei, a former “tantric sex instructor” turned libertarian economist. Milei has raged against the scourge of global “socialism,” floated such ideas as allowing human organ sales, and is a staunch opponent of abortion. Milei has greatly benefited from the support of Elon Musk, who has turned him into a global star on social media. Argentine far-right influencers linked to the Milei administration, such as “Gordo Dan,” have said that since the purchase of Twitter by Elon Musk, restrictions for their speech on social media disappeared, and they attribute Milei’s victory at least in part to Musk allowing them to spread their propaganda.

Milei’s basic message is that he is in line with the world’s far-right populists who are opposed to politically correct ideas such as social justice, feminism, and climate change. Milei’s rise represents a significant shift towards the far-right in Argentina, reflecting a broader global trend (see documentation of the global rise of the far right in GPAHE country reports). Milei has become an integral player in the far-right conference circuit, speaking in July 2024 at CPAC Brazil, known as a font of anti- rights and anti-LGBTQ+ rhetoric. Milei gave a big hug to Bolsonaro at the event, who just days earlier was indicted for a scheme to embezzle Saudi diamonds. Milei called that “judicial persecution.” 

In February 2024, at a CPAC event in Washington, D.C., Milei hugged Donald Trump and took pictures with him. And in May, he was the star at a huge meeting of the far right put on by the Spanish political party Vox, which has ties to Holocaust deniers and other extremists. Also speaking at the Vox convening was new Argentine Worship Secretary, Francisco Sánchez, who has a checkered past when it comes to respecting non-Catholic religions. At the Vox meeting, Sánchez spoke in opposition to divorce, equal marriage, abortion, and said that “gender ideology” was being forced upon children in schools. At Milei’s inauguration, he hosted Hungarian Prime Minister Victor Orbán, whose regime has been described as an “electoral autocracy” by the EU Parliament.

Much of Milei’s polarizing rhetoric is aimed at demonizing the political class and the left. Milei claims the need to combat what he calls the “political caste” of “corrupt politicians” and “socialists” who he asserts ruined the country. He frames, as many with authoritarian instincts do, the population as being divided between “good Argentines” and “thieves,” presumably meaning the left. Milei uses Twitter as a major communications tool for his regime, and the prime location from which to go after his critics. These range from journalists and celebrities to anyone who disagrees with his policies. 

He has threatened other authoritarian moves. In March, Milei said he planned to shut down the public news service Télam, the largest and most prestigious news agency in Argentina. “We will close the news agency Télam, which has been used as a Kirchnerist propaganda agency for the last decades,” Milei told lawmakers, referring to former president Cristina Kirchner. He followed through on his promise July 1, 2024, announcing the official closing of the Télam state news agency and its transformation into an “advertising and state propaganda agency,” a clear hallmark of the growth of authoritarianism.

Unlike Bolsonaro, Milei has been less openly bigoted, even firing a minister who defended Argentine soccer players who engaged in racist rants after a game with the French national team. At the same time, in 2023, he appointed as Solicitor General, Rodolfo Barra, a former Minister of Justice forced to resign in 1996 due to his past in the antisemitic Tacuara. The appointment was hotly contested by the Jewish community in Argentina. His appointment of Sánchez as Secretary of Worship also brought criticism. Sánchez has vehemently criticized the Pope, although he has retracted and apologized for his statements. He has also called for the death penalty for former President Cristina Kirchner and, referencing the anniversary of the Spanish defeat of the Ottoman Empire, said, “Good day to remember the deed that saved Christianity and the West from the Islamic hordes.” And in an interview, referenced antisemitic conspiracy theories, saying about George Soros and the Rockefellers that they are a part of the “international Zionism that dominates the world.” Sánchez and the government parted ways in July 2024, after only five months in his post. 

Where Milei has shown his bigotry most is when it comes to LGBTQ+ and women’s rights. Milei is indifferent to same-sex marriage and said homosexuality is a “personal choice” and not a disease. But he has made problematic comments nonetheless about the LGBTQ+ community. In a YouTube interview ahead of the 2023 election, Milei compared homosexuality to having sex with animals. After taking office, Milei took steps that critics say weakened protections for LGBTQ+ people. He banned the use of gender-inclusive language in government; replaced the Ministry of Women, Gender and Diversity with a less powerful undersecretariat within the Ministry of Human Capital; and effectively closed the national anti-discrimination agency, saying the Ministry of Justice would absorb its functions. He also ended a quota on government jobs for transgender people. 

In an announcement timed for International Women’s Day on March 8, Milei renamed the Women’s Hall in the presidential palace to Hall of Heroes. Milei has also scrapped a decree calling for gender equality in companies and civil society groups and ended gender-focused training programs. Milei’s administration argued that some of those moves were part of his plan to cut public spending in response to the country’s economic hardships. But critics say his actions have normalized a culture of discrimination toward the LGBTQ+ community.

On the international front, the Argentine government has taken far-right positions. In October 2023, Milei defended his climate change denialist positions and declared that Argentina would not adhere to the UN 2030 Agenda because of its association with “cultural Marxism” and “decadence.” In January 2024, Milei participated in the Davos Economic Forum where he said the space was “contaminated with the socialist agenda 2030 that will only bring misery to the world” and that he was against the “murderous agenda of abortion,” declaring that feminists are his enemies. 

Before the 2023 UN General Assembly,  Argentina submitted a document with “suggestions and comments” to the draft resolution on the promotion and protection of human rights. These consisted of deleting all references to the 2030 Agenda on climate change, deleting the words women, gender and intersectionality, as well as deleting all references to LGBTQ+ people and rights. Argentina also removed lines referring to concerns about “regressive movements in human rights” and objected to a paragraph which states that the parties condemn “hate speech and manifestations, incitement and acts of violence” because of prejudice based on sexual orientation, gender identity or expression. Milei’s libertarian government argued that such wording “uses broad language without definitions on hate speech that could serve anti-democratic purposes and limit freedom of expression.” These positions are almost identical to those of the American Project 2025, a far-right plan to instill authoritarianism into the U.S. government, led by the Heritage Project and supported by dozens of extreme conservative organizations.

These similarities fit not only with the global rise of the far-right, which routinely demonizes the LGBTQ+ community and immigrants, and is determined to strip hard-won rights from women, but the growing international influence of American far-right groups. The former Secretary of Worship Sánchez is a member of the virulently anti-rights American-based but transnational group, the Political Network for Values, which is very active at the UN and in Latin America. Another example of Argentine-U.S. collaboration is Sebastian Schuff, a lawyer and the founder of the organization, Prodeci, dedicated to “defending the right to life, religious freedom, and family rights.” Schuff is also the president of the Global Center for Human Rights (GCHR), based in Washington, D.C., focused on advocating its mission to “build and consolidate a new generation of decision-makers willing to defend life, family, freedom of religion, and democracy” to U.S. and multilateral agency policymakers.” GCHR held an event in April in the Chamber of Deputies that was attended by members of Milei’s government. 

In keeping with the global far right and Christian Nationalist approaches to messaging, the website language is quite human rights focused, hiding the true goal of excluding human communities from equal rights and preferencing Christian religious freedom rights in society and government. Schuff’s wife, Neydy Casillas, a lawyer from Mexico, serves as vice president for international affairs. Casillas previously served in the same role at Concerned Women for America, an anti-rights organization and Project 2025 supporter, that wants to bring biblical values to government policies, and as senior legal counsel at Alliance Defending Freedom, a hardline Christian Nationalist, anti-rights group behind many of the U.S. Supreme Court decisions stripping women and the LGBTQ+ community of their rights. Alliance Defending Freedom is also a supporter of the American Project 2025. Schuff and Casillas made news in June 2022, when they stood in front of the U.S. Supreme Court holding signs, one of a tombstone saying “Roe  1973-2022” and the other saying “We will adopt your baby,” a false narrative in opposition to abortion. The image they posted on Instagram became the subject of viral memes.

Hate Crimes

Even though Argentina has a law that prohibits discrimination and carrying out “propaganda based on ideas or theories of superiority of a race or a group of persons of a certain religion, ethnic origin or color,” it still suffers from some spectacular and horrific hate crimes. In 2021, two men were arrested for a plot to attack a synagogue during Shabbat in Tucuman Province. Vandalism against Jewish sites is rather common, such as in July 2023, when there was antisemitic vandalism at the AMIA (Argentine Israelite Mutual Association) Jewish community center in Buenos Aires. Graffiti featuring swastikas and hateful slogans was discovered on the premises, prompting condemnation from both local authorities and international Jewish organizations. 

In October 2021, there were reports of racial discrimination and violence against Afro-Argentines and Indigenous people. Incidents included physical attacks and verbal abuse, often linked to broader issues of racial and ethnic intolerance in various regions of Argentina. In October 2021, there were several incidents of violence and intimidation against Indigenous activists in the province of Formosa. Throughout 2022, there were multiple reports of hate crimes and acts of discrimination targeting Indigenous people, particularly in rural areas. These included physical assaults and threats, often linked to conflicts over land and resources. Generally, these hate crimes are part of a broader pattern of hostility towards Indigenous land rights movements. 

Argentina has long been considered one of the most progressive countries in the world for the LGBTQ+ community, with about 76 percent of the population saying that homosexuality should be accepted, being the first in Latin America to adopt equal marriage, having strong transgender rights laws, and in 2010 outlawing conversion therapy from the basis of mental health. Buenos Aires has been called the most gay-friendly travel destination in South America. However, this does not stop anti-LGBTQ+ hate crimes, especially in a growing hostile environment, largely pushed by political figures. 

In March 2019, an anti-LGBTQ+ hate crime occurred when a transgender woman was brutally attacked in Buenos Aires. In September 2022, a series of attacks targeting LGBTQ+ individuals were reported in Buenos Aires. These included physical assaults and harassment in public spaces, reflecting ongoing issues with anti-LGBTQ+ beliefs and violence against the community. In 2024, 10 police officers were arrested after a trans individual was found dead in a jail cell the prior year. In 2024, the nation was rocked when four lesbians in Buenos Aires were attacked with a Molotov cocktail, with three perishing. The four impoverished women were sharing one room with no bathroom in an apartment building. The horrific crime was not investigated as a hate crime with a representative of Milei’s government saying, “It seems very unfair to me to only talk about this event, when violence is something much more comprehensive than simply an issue against a certain group.” These incidents highlight the violence faced by LGBTQ+ individuals and have spurred advocacy for greater protections and support. 

Neo-Nazi Violence

It remains to be seen if the rise of Milei will embolden neo-Nazis and white supremacists in the country, as was the case with Bolsonaro in Brazil, and Donald Trump in the U.S. Such organizations have long been active in Argentina, but they are not as numerous as in other parts of Latin America, such as Brazil (see GPAHE Brazil country report). Even so, there have been multiple raids on neo-Nazis and similar organizations in recent years, many involved in violence. At times, small neo-Nazi political parties, like the Patriot Front, have run candidates in elections. In 2023, the police shut down a major online publisher, Librería Argentina, in a “historic seizure” of Nazi propaganda, which was also sold on mainstream sites. There is also a considerable amount of antisemitism and conspiracy theories, including the Andinia Plan and QAnon, circulating in the Argentinian online world. And it shouldn’t be forgotten that in 2022, a Brazilian living in Argentina and tattooed with a Nazi symbol was arrested for the attempted assassination of Argentina’s then-Vice President Cristina Kirchner. There are also various skinhead and white nationalist factions that have been linked to extremist activities.

The history of fascist and far-right movements in Argentina has been marked by periods of significant influence, whether under populist or military regimes. The unique immigration policy of the country, focused on importing “white” Europeans has played a significant role in fascist, racist, and antisemitic movements over the years. From early fascist groups in the 1930s to the brutal repression of the Dirty War and the recent rise of populist figures, these movements have shaped Argentine political dynamics in complex ways. While traditional fascist movements have largely faded, their ideological legacy, particularly in the form of racism, antisemitism, and a relatively new development, anti-LGBTQ+ activism, influence contemporary far-right politics in the country. The election of Milei to the presidency, and his growing ties to far-right anti-rights movements abroad, may well embolden certain sectors of the far right moving forward, particularly those focused on anti-LGBTQ+ and anti-woman activism.

This report most certainly underestimates the actual number of far-right hate and extremist groups in Argentina and does not reflect the extent to which individuals may share these beliefs but are not involved in organized entities. It also does not include activities that happen purely online with no real-world presence. Cities marked with an asterisk indicate an organization’s headquarters where it has more than one chapter.