Last Updated on November 28, 2023
Argentine President-elect Javier Milei is converting to Judaism after winning his nation’s highest office, according to a Milei spokesperson. Milei’s conversion to Judaism is a unique development considering that Argentina is overwhelmingly Catholic, and comes as Milei vows to make Argentina Israel’s top supporter in Latin America.
Javier Milei is in the middle of a religious conversion to Judaism, according to a Bloomberg report profiling the Argentine President-elect’s ongoing trip to the United States where, before meeting with any American leaders, he stopped in Queens, NY to visit the city’s Orthodox Jewish community. While there, Milei donned a Kippah as he prayed at the resting place of Menachem Mendel Schneerson, a 20th-century rabbi who divided devout Jewish communities as many of his followers believed him to be the Messiah.
“The president-elect is converting to Judaism,” Bloomberg reported on Milei, citing “one of his spokespersons” and adding that “on Saturday [Milei] participated in a Jewish ceremony in Buenos Aires where he received a blessing from another rabbi.”
Though Milei was raised Roman Catholic, he expressed admiration for Schneerson even before his conversion to Judaism was announced, and according to the Jewish publication Chabad, Milei “has frequently expressed a deep love and admiration for Judaism and the Jewish people, and has spoken about his reverence for [Schneerson] in interviews during the campaign.”
The announcement of Milei’s conversion to Judaism comes just over a week after he won a run-off election against Peronist candidate Sergio Massa, interrupting decades of left-wing rule in Argentina.
Milei says that, as President, he will make Argentina Israel’s staunchest ally in Latin America and has expressed a desire to pivot his country away from Communist China and toward the United States, economically and politically speaking.
Though Milei has been widely described as a “right-wing outsider” and as the symbol of a renewed populist uprising at the ballot box worldwide, the economist-turned-politician has been criticized in the wake of his election victory for his ties to the World Economic Forum.
As National File reported shortly after Milei’s election:
According to the World Economic Forum’s website, In 2014, Javier Milei attended the World Economic Forum on Latin America in Panama City, Panama, and was listed as a participant in a discussion about “Investing in Human Capital.”
Notably, the discussion came as the WEF and its partner groups around the globe began a hard push into Latin America, presumably in search of developing governments and cheap labor to seize control of.
In the years since, the group’s hard push into the region has continued and, as reported by National File, the World Economic Forum has openly meddled in Latin American elections, including those held in Paraguay earlier this year.
