This Man Is Going To Be President Of Argentina For 12 Hours

From midnight to noon, Senate Leader Federico Pinedo is gonna be running the show.

By
Hayes Brown
by Hayes Brown

BuzzFeed News World Editor

See the man on the left? He's going to be the next President of Argentina. But only for about 12 hours.

Marcos Brindicci / Reuters

...It's a little complicated. Let's back up a little.

Current President Cristina Fernandez de Kirchner lost her bid to have her heir apparent succeed her in November, with Daniel Scioli losing to Buenos Aires Mayor — and secret dad rocker — Mauricio Macri in a run-off election.

Enrique Marcarian / Reuters

The last few years of Kirchner's time in office have been, for lack of a better phrase, kind of nuts: a prosecutor who accused her government of covering up a terrorist plot from Iran turned up dead; she tried to dissolve the government's intelligence service afterwards; she sort of adopted a Jewish godchild; and, for good measure, mocked Chinese people's accents.

President-elect Macri is due to be sworn in on Thursday at noon. But over the last few days, Kirchner has actually ramped up spending, increased government hiring, growing the deficit, and basically doing everything Macri ran against.

Ivan Alvarado / Reuters

Presumably wanting a clean break and to prevent any possible trickery, he actually filed a petition with the federal courts asking them to rule that Kirchner's term ends at midnight tonight. “This measure is intended to prevent the President from taking decisions that could affect the incoming authorities in the inauguration ceremony on Dec. 10,” the legal filing said.

The courts agreed, but now that leaves Argentina in a place where they'll no longer have Kirchner as President — but Macri won't be sworn in yet either. Enter Senate leader Federico Pinedo: soon to be the shortest-lived president in Argentine history.

Marcos Brindicci / Reuters

Kirchner is now boycotting Macri's swearing-in because she wanted to hold the ceremonial handover of the presidential sash in Congress, but Macri wanted the event split between Congress and the presidential palace.

Marcos Brindicci / Reuters

So, it's Federico's time to shine! He'll only have twelve hours before handing over the sash, but since he's one of Macri's allies, it'll probably be a pretty quiet term of office.

Federico Pinedo @PinedoFederico

@AlexCampbellOK en San Fernando, @mariuvidal Gobernadora #MacriPresidente #VamosJuntos

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CORRECTION

Cristina Fernandez de Kirchner did not run in the most recent Argentine elections due to term limits. A previous version of this article indicated that she was running for re-election.

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