Trump offers $20 billion bailout to Argentina

https://www.nytimes.com/2025/09/25/us/politics/trump-argentina-milei-bailout.html

Trump Wades Into Bailout Politics in Offering a Lifeline to Argentina
A $20 billion loan to support Argentina’s president, Javier Milei, could come with economic and political risks.
By Alan Rappeport and Colby Smith
Sept. 25, 2025 Updated 4:15 p.m. ET

Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said this week that if New York City needed a federal bailout under the leadership of the mayoral candidate Zohran Mamdani, it would be rebuffed by the Trump administration with two words.

“Drop dead,” Mr. Bessent said in an interview on Fox Business.

But Argentina is a different story. The Treasury Department has been working to prop up its sputtering economy, and on Wednesday Mr. Bessent declared that the United States was ready to extend a $20 billion lifeline.

The moves are intended to buttress the fortunes of Javier Milei, Argentina’s embattled president, whom President Trump sees as a kindred political spirit.

By offering economic support to Argentina, the Trump administration is wading into the precarious politics of bailouts, which Republicans traditionally loathe. By using America’s economic power to influence another country’s election, the president is tying the United States to the financial fate of Argentina, which has been plagued for decades with surging inflation and rampant debt.

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