The Empire Files Back
Milei's top lawyers fired 36 pages at the shopkeeper ruling, and the appeal landed on my desk before any newsroom saw it.
Welcome Avatar! Two weeks ago I told you the story of the shopkeeper who broke Argentina’s Golden Passport: Liping Yang, a Chinese supermarket owner from Entre Ríos whose citizenship request gave the Cámara Nacional Electoral (CNE) the opening to declare Milei’s citizenship reform decree null and void. That decree moved naturalizations from federal judges, their turf since 1869, to the immigration office (DNM). It is also the legal floor under the citizenship by investment program.
The government promised to fight back. On July 1st officials called the ruling a “delirium” and would go to the Corte Suprema. Since then, silence. No outlet has seen the actual appeal.
This Patagonian rodent has.
A copy of the recurso extraordinario federal landed on my desk this week, which runs 36 pages and carries the signatures of Sebastián Amerio, the Procurador del Tesoro, the state’s top lawyer, his deputy Santiago Castro Videla, and counsel for the Ministry of Security and the DNM.
When the Procurador del Tesoro signs a brief personally instead of delegating it three floors down, the Casa Rosada considers the matter existential.