Public university protests escalate in challenge to Argentina's President Milei

BUENOS AIRES, Argentina -- In a burst of adrenaline, the Argentine students charged into oncoming traffic.

Trucks screeched to a halt. Motorbikes swerved. Some drivers flipped their middle fingers, yelling insults. Others pumped their fists in solidarity, howling, “Public and free education!” as the University of Buenos Aires protesters took over lane after highway lane, their fear turning to gasping, giddy exhilaration as they chanted against libertarian President Javier Milei's university budget cuts.

“We're here for our teachers, to demand that they get decent salaries,” said architecture student Ivan Rocha, struggling to be heard over the singing and honking.

Last week's road blockades were the latest in a series of protests this month expected to intensify across Argentina in response to Milei's veto of a law increasing funding for public universities. Many professors began a 48-hour strike Monday.

After convincing centrist lawmakers to abandon their support for the teacher salary boost meant to compensate for sky-high inflation, Milei’s minority far-right government upheld the veto in the Senate earlier this month. The measure would have cost 0.14% of gross domestic product, according to a congressional budget analysis.

“It was a test of Milei’s strength, to show that he’s able to sustain a presidential veto," said Ignacio Labaqui, a Buenos Aires-based senior analyst at risk consultancy Medley Global Advisors. “It goes beyond a mere economic calculus."

The self-declared “anarcho-capitalist” president, who rode to power in November 2023 on a pledge to reverse decades of unbridled spending, has vowed to veto any attempt to undermine his zero-deficit program.

“They are only interested in their coffers to maintain their privileges,” Milei said after his legislative victory, attacking public universities as hotbeds of leftist radicals with too much administrative bloat. Authorities on Monday began an audit of how the immense University of Buenos Aires, or UBA, spends state funding.

For the chronically overcrowded and underfunded universities, which saw a 30% budget reduction during Milei's 10 months in office, the veto is seen as nothing short of a threat to Argentina's proud system of free tuition and open admissions — long a bedrock of middle-class advancement.

“We have reached a point that is unprecedented in the democratic history of our country, and, if this continues, we'll be at a point of no return,” warned Ricardo Gelpi, the rector of UBA.

Over the first weeks of October, tens of thousands of protesters took to the streets across the country, from the gates of Congress to remote mountain valleys.

“It’s a fundamental right that I grew up with,” said Ivan Fleming, a 24-year-old student of education at the University of La Plata near the capital. “I feel that my own desire of being a teacher one day is under attack.”

Last week, hundreds of professors transformed the streets of Buenos Aires into open-air classrooms — delivering lectures through microphones to students who struggled to maintain focus as honking cars streamed past their wooden desks. On Tuesday, protesters plan a vast “teach-in” at Plaza de Mayo, the main government square, to demand that teachers' paychecks keep pace with inflation, which topped 290% earlier this year.

“Students are spearheading this movement, and if we win, it will be an example to workers and everyone else fighting for their salaries,” said 22-year-old University of Buenos Aires protester Micaela Fioresta.

That is what Milei hopes to prevent.

In April, a mass rally against education budget cuts swelled into one of the biggest showdowns of Milei’s tenure, marshaling an unusually wide cross-section of the Argentine public.

“He got a taste of the consequences in April and one would assume he wouldn’t want to engage in this conflict again,” said Marcelo J. García, director for the Americas at New York-based geopolitical risk consultancy Horizon Engage.

Under pressure in April, Milei increased the budget enough for universities to keep their lights on and elevators running.

But the raise to cover operational costs didn’t account for teachers' salaries — already low wages that shriveled by 24% between November 2023 and August 2024, according to the federation of university unions.

With Milei's shock therapy dragging an estimated 5.5 million more people into poverty in the last half-year, over 70% of teachers’ salaries now fall below the official poverty line, Argentina’s national council of universities estimates.

The government offered bumping teachers’ meager paychecks up by 6.8%. Unions have asked for 63.5%.

Universities warn of mass resignations as more teachers take their energies to private classrooms and lessons. The University of Qulimes in the Buenos Aires Province announced last week that critical resource shortages had forced it to suspend some course enrollment.

“We've had attempts to cut back spending before, but this is unlike anything I've ever seen,” said Ana Rusconi, a sociologist at the University of La Plata, who also teaches high school to augment her $200 a month professor's salary. “The protests now aren't even about moving forward, they're about recovering what the government stole from us.”

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Associated Press reporter Almudena Calatrava contributed to this report.