President Javier Milei defended Chief of Staff Manuel Adorni against illicit enrichment allegations on Thursday, insisting he is “innocent” and ruling out his removal from the national administration.
“Not in a million years will Adorni leave,” Milei said — loosely translating the spirit of his more colloquial Spanish phrasing: “Ni en pedo se va Adorni.”
On Wednesday night, the libertarian leader gave an unexpected TV interview of almost an hour to back Adorni. He spoke from Los Angeles, in the United States, where he was invited as one of the speakers at right-wing think tank Milken Institute’s global conference. It was his 17th trip to the U.S.
“I don’t execute innocents, even when the innocence of those people bothers the press whose egos he hurt,” Milei said on La Nación+ in an interview with journalists Luis Majul and Esteban Trebucq, two of the few reporters he generally speaks to.
Adorni is being investigated after it was discovered he purchased and renewed two properties and paid for several expensive family trips in cash — and in dollars — since he joined the national administration as presidential spokesman in late 2023.
The judiciary is looking into whether those expenditures — which allegedly add up to more than US$800.000 — match his income as a public official and, if not, where he got the money from.
The chief of staff had failed to declare one of the properties, a house in a gated community, in his 2024 assets statement, filed in August. He recently added it to the statement.
He now has until July 31 to present his 2025 assets statement, in which he should include an apartment he bought in November.
According to Milei, Adorni will soon file his new declared assets statement, and he said the chief of staff has already shown him the numbers and that they are “clear.”
“When I learn someone is dirty, I have no problem with executing anyone,” Milei said, clarifying he will not dismiss Adorni because “he is clean.”
Bullrich’s criticism
Milei’s comments come after senator and ex-security minister Patricia Bullrich, a former rival for the presidency who became one of the president’s strongest allies and is now a member of his party La Libertad Avanza (LLA), demanded that Adorni present his declared assets statement “immediately” so as to “not further drag the issue on.”
“He can already file his assets statement; why would he wait until July 31 if he can do so now?” Bullrich said, speaking with A24 news channel in an unexpected blow against her fellow party member.
“I am part of this project, and I want this [scandal] to last as little as possible because people cannot be left with the idea that we are the same as those we kicked out [of the government],” she said, in a veiled reference to the former Peronist government.
Public officials have to file their assets statement yearly. The deadline for Adorni to do so was initially May 30, although the Anticorruption Office gave him an extension until late July after the scandal had broken.
Asked about Bullrich’s comments, Milei said she had merely “spoiled” the news that Adorni intended to present his statement early.
“Manuel already has everything ready and is about to show his numbers early,” the president said, adding that Adorni decided to do so “because of the stupid things that are being debated publicly.”
The goal, the president stated, is to “put an end to all these fantasies and lies spread by a great liar,” referring to deputy Marcela Pagano, a former LLA member and current rival, who filed a legal complaint against Adorni for allegedly pressuring a witness — an architect who renovated Adorni’s homes and declared on Monday that the chief of staff had paid him US$245,000 in cash and had asked to speak to him before he gave his testimony.
“The numbers are in order and will be filed. We are not worried about it,” Milei said.
