Argentine Foreign Minister Gerardo Werthein resigns four days before midterms - sparking Milei administration's fury [View all]

Argentine Foreign Minister Gerardo Werthein's departure - four days before upcoming midterm elections - sparked fury in the far-right Javier Milei administration.

Although the foreign minister's fate had been sealed for days, the administration had expected to make his resignation public next week - after crucial midterm elections on Sunday.

The administration believes Werthein himself leaked the news hours ago, provoking anger against the now former official.

Werthein, 69, is a member of Argentina's most prominent Jewish family, one of the country's few billionaires - and perhaps the only high-level Milei official to enjoy bipartisan respect in the U.S.

He had already informed President Milei of his decision to resign a few days ago - a move reportedly provoked by an ongoing rivalry with Santiago Caputo, who, despite having no official title, is one of Milei's closest advisors.

Usurped foreign ministry

Caputo, 40, enjoys a wide social media following among Argentine right-wing youth, and is a nephew of Finance Minister Luis Caputo - whose reliance on carry-trade investments (which are quickly dollarized and offshored, leaving an added foreign debt burden used to finance said dollarization) had already bankrupted the country in 2018.

Caputo has spent most of the past week with longtime GOP fixer Barry Bennett, 62 - who, according to Argentine congressional sources, pressured just enough lower house members to vote against overriding a recent Milei veto (after losing three such override votes so far this month).

Werthein reportedly believes Caputo has usurped his role as Foreign Minister - and blames him for pinning U.S. President Donald Trump's equivocating statements on Werthein during the October 14 White House meeting with Milei.

Trump stated that "if he [Milei] loses, we are not going to be generous with Argentina" - in reference to an announced US$20 billion currency swap.

The U.S. Treasury has already spent over US$1 billion to prop up the flagging Argentine peso since October 9th - but to little effect.

"We're buying every single dollar they sell," an Argentine currency broker recently stated to the prominent local online journal El Destape - a reflection of heightened dollarizing and offshoring activity.

At: https://www-eldestapeweb-com.translate.goog/politica/gerardo-werthein/furia-en-casa-rosada-contra-werthein-acusaciones-graves-y-los-candidatos-para-su-reemplazo-2025102214652?_x_tr_sl=es&_x_tr_tl=en&_x_tr_hl=en&_x_tr_pto=wapp

Stuck in the middle, Argentine Foreign Minister Gerardo Werthein looks down behind President Javier Milei (right) and Milei's closest political adviser, Santiago Caputo (left).

Werthein's resignation comes four days before midterm elections - which have acquired outsized international attention after U.S. President Donald Trump pledged at least US$20 billion in taxpayer funds in an unprecedented bid to influence the results.

Polls show Milei's far-right Liberty Forward (LLA) coalition well behind the center-left, Peronist-led Homeland Strength coalition - in midterm elections President Trump appears to believe are instead presidential.