The formation of the commissions of Deputies that must begin to deal with the omnibus bill sent by President Javier Milei began in the midst of a scandal, with legislators shouting and with a strong questioning by Kirchnerism and the left to the way in which José Luis Espert was appointed as president of the Budget Commission.
Prior to the formal act of designation of the authorities of the commissions of Deputies, a climate of tension was already ventured between the ruling party and the pro-dialogue blocs and the Union for the Fatherland, which complained that in the distribution of the places in the open commissions for the treatment of the project sent by the Executive, the application of the D'hondt system was not respected.
The debate began relatively normally with Deputy Carlos Zapata proposing the Liberal José Luis Espert to chair the Budget Commission and Germán Martínez, head of the UP bloc, asking for the floor to complain that the Speaker of the House, Martín Menem, had decided to informally constitute the commissions with the allied blocs without notifying the Peronist bench.
"They did not respect the composition of the commissions under the D'hondt system and unilaterally resolved the transfer to three commissions," said the Santa Fe native while the administrative secretary asked him to close his speech, and the ruling party was pressuring Espert to formally assume the position. That was how they quickly moved to the vote, preventing other legislators who had asked to speak from speaking.
Among the demands of the opposition deputies, Espert occupied the presidency accompanied by the rest of the authorities elected to lead one of the key committees of the Chamber. This is how they sat next to the economist, Deputy Germana Figueroa Casa (PRO) and secretaries Bertie Benegas Lynch and Lisandro Nieri. Ignacio García Aresca from Cordoba and Pamela Calletti, who had also been appointed as secretaries, were not at the table.
From the background, Christian Castillo, the representative of the left in the commission, unsuccessfully asked to speak to challenge Espert's appointment because at one point he had asked for "jail or bullet" for his colleagues Myriam Bregman and Nicolás del Caño. Faced with the tense situation, the economist closed the meeting by announcing that in the coming days he would give the commission's schedule.
In the midst of the shouting, Benegas Lynch intervened. "Being that I come from outside politics, my first immersion in this, I find what I'm seeing unpresentable." "The unpresentable one is you," he was told by the UP bloc. "This is unusual," added the libertarian, who warned the legislators that "there are people eating from the garbage on Entre Rios Avenue, I ask for your collaboration to move this country forward from Kirchner's decadence."
Figueroa Casas experienced a moment of tension when the camporista Paula Penacca reproached her for not having voted for her. Strictly speaking, the Santa Fe native found out when she arrived in Congress because there was no proposal to occupy the position since in reality it was going to be for Luciano Laspina, who dropped out of the commission. Nor did they allow the radical Lisandro Nieri to speak.
When the tension grew, Espert closed the session and announced that he was going to be advising how the omnibus bill is going to be worked on. In the background, insults were heard against Milei's ally as a "soldier" or "dictator." The meeting ended in embarrassment and the authorities of the commissions were ratified by the administrative secretary.