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      Javier Milei, a ‘Mini-Trump,’ Could Be Argentina’s Next President

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      He made his name disparaging people on television. He levels harsh attacks against critics online. He sports an unruly hairdo that has become a meme. And he is now the leader of his country’s far right.Donald J. Trump, and his rise to the American presidency in 2016, shares some striking similarities with the man behind the moment unfolding in Argentina, the nation’s new political sensation, Javier Milei.Mr. Milei, a libertarian economist and television pundit, was once seen as a sideshow in Argentina’s presidential race, not taken seriously by the news media or his opponents. Now — after a brash, outsider campaign based on a promise that he alone can fix the nation’s deep economic woes — he is the favorite to win the election outright on Sunday or head to a runoff next month.Mr. Milei, 52, has already upended the politics of this nation of 46 million. His pledges to eliminate Argentina’s central bank and ditch its currency for the U.S. dollar have dominated the national conversation, while also helping to fuel a further collapse in the value of the Argentine peso.But it has been his bellicose political style that has attracted comparisons with Mr. Trump, as well as widespread concern in Argentina and beyond about the damage his government could inflict on Latin America’s third-largest economy.Mr. Milei has attacked the press and the pope; declared climate change part of “the socialist agenda”; called China, Argentina’s second-largest trade partner, an “assassin”; pledged looser controls on guns; claimed he is the victim of voter fraud; questioned the most recent presidential elections in the United States and Brazil; and suggested that the far-right riots that followed those votes were leftist plots.Mr. Milei surrounded by supporters in Salta, Argentina. His brash, outsider campaign has made him a favorite in Sunday’s election. Sarah Pabst for The New York Times“He is quite clearly a mini-Trump,” said Federico Finchelstein, an Argentine who chairs the history department at the New School in New York and studies the far right around the world.Mr. Milei, Mr. Trump and Jair Bolsonaro, Brazil’s former president, are all leading practitioners of the modern strain of far-right politics, Mr. Finchelstein said, marked by vulgarity, attacks on institutions, discrediting of the news media, distrust of science, a cult of personality and narcissism.“Trump is an icon of this new form of extreme populism,” Mr. Finchelstein said. “And Milei wants to emulate him.”Mr. Milei has embraced comparisons to Mr. Trump, whom he has called “one of the best presidents in the history of the United States.” He has worn “Make Argentina Great Again” hats and, much like Mr. Trump, waged his campaign largely on social media. And in the two months before Sunday’s vote, he granted an interview to one American broadcast personality: the former Fox News host Tucker Carlson.Mr. Milei’s campaign declined repeated requests for an interview with The New York Times.Supporters of Mr. Milei in the headquarters of his party in Salta. Mr. Milei’s use of social media has made him especially popular among younger Argentines.Sarah Pabst for The New York TimesWith two master’s degrees in economics, Mr. Milei can sound professorial at times, opining on monetary policy and a strain of libertarianism he follows called anarcho-capitalism.He has called the state “a criminal organization” that collects taxes “at gunpoint.” And he says he is driven by a mission to shrink government and remove it from people’s lives, starting with Argentina’s central bank.His libertarian ideals have also made him less conservative on some social issues. He has said that as long as the state doesn’t have to pay for it, he could support drug legalization, open immigration, sex work, transgender rights, same-sex marriage and selling organs.Abortion, however, he calls “murder” and promises to put it to a referendum in Argentina, where it has been legal since 2020.Mr. Milei surprised pollsters in August when he won Argentina’s open primaries with about 30 percent of the vote. He has since led his two main challengers in the polls: Sergio Massa, Argentina’s center-left economy minister; and Patricia Bullrich, a right-wing former security minister.Mr. Milei has received nearly blanket news coverage during the campaign, both for his radical economic proposals and his eccentric personality. He is a self-proclaimed tantric-sex teacher with five cloned mastiff dogs. His girlfriend is a professional impersonator of one of his political archrivals. And his campaign manager and chief political adviser is his sister.A dollar note with Donald J. Trump’s image in the office of one of Mr. Milei’s advisers. The candidate has praised Mr. Trump’s tenure as president in the United States. Sarah Pabst for The New York TimesLike Mr. Trump, he speaks about the importance of image, telling Mr. Carlson that his past as a semipro soccer goalie and a singer in a Rolling Stones cover band “make for an attractive television product.” Mr. Milei makes nearly the same furrowed-brow, pursed-lip look for every selfie with voters, also calling to mind Mr. Trump.Mr. Milei’s signature look — a leather jacket, an untamable mop of hair and long sideburns — is designed to conjure the comic-book character Wolverine, according to Lilia Lemoine, a professional cosplay performer who is Mr. Milei’s stylist and is running for Congress on his ticket. Because, like Wolverine, she said, “he is an antihero.”The result is a cultlike following. At a recent event in Salta, a city in Argentina’s mountainous northwest, Mr. Milei rode in a truck bed as thousands of voters pushed in for a closer look. Supporters wore messy wigs, passed out fake $100 bills with his face and displayed art of his dogs, four of which are named for conservative economists.“Yes, everyone describes him as crazy, for everything, but who better than a crazy person to move the country forward?” said María Luisa Mamani, 57, a butcher-shop owner. “Because the sane ones didn’t do anything.”Argentines have weathered one of the country’s worst financial crises.Sarah Pabst for The New York TimesMr. Milei appeared briefly but did not speak. Instead, the event was largely a stage for social-media content created by unpaid college-age influencers who travel with Mr. Milei and film him.They have helped him build an enormous online presence and intense youth following. (The legal voting age in Argentina is 16.) Luján López Villa, 20, a high school senior in the small town of Chicoana, said Mr. Milei had near-unanimous support among her classmates, largely because he was the “cool” candidate, despite warnings from teachers that his plans to dollarize the economy are dangerous.“They want to change our minds,” she said. “We’re going to keep following him.”It is no surprise that Argentines are eager for change. Decades of economic mismanagement, much of it in the hands of Mr. Massa’s incumbent Peronist party, have plunged Argentina into a big financial hole.In April 2020, at the start of the pandemic, $1 bought about 80 pesos; one day last week, $1 bought more than 1,000 pesos. Those figures are under an unofficial exchange rate that best reflects the market’s view of the peso, part of a byzantine system of currency controls the government uses to try to keep U.S. dollars in the country.Supporters of Mr. Milei in Salta. He wants to shrink government, starting with getting rid of Argentina’s central bank.Sarah Pabst for The New York TimesMr. Milei wants to discard those rules as president, partly by switching to dollars.Both Mr. Milei and economists have said that dollarizing the economy will most likely require tens of billions of dollars, but it is not clear where Argentina could get such an investment. The country is struggling to pay a $44 billion debt to the International Monetary Fund. Mr. Milei would also not have much congressional support for dollarization, though he has said that he would put the issue to a national referendum.Emmanuel Alvarez Agis, Argentina’s former deputy economy minister under a leftist administration, said that if Mr. Milei could dollarize, it would mostly solve inflation — but produce a host of other problems, including a decrease in real wages, higher unemployment and less flexibility to soften the effects of economic downturns.Mr. Milei has also promised a pro-market, small-government overhaul, including pledges to: lower taxes; slash regulations; privatize state industries; shift public education to a voucher-based system and public health care to insurance based; reduce the number of federal ministries to eight from 18; and cut federal spending by 15 percent of Argentina’s gross domestic product.Such deep spending cuts would require significant reductions to pensions, education and public safety, Mr. Alvarez Agis said. “I don’t think that they are discussing numbers in a serious way,” he said.Campaign signs in Salta for another top candidate in Sunday’s election, Sergio Massa, Argentina’s center-left economy minister.Sarah Pabst for The New York TimesAfter months of campaigning by the candidates, Sunday will test whether voters are ready to take a chance on Mr. Milei. He could win the election outright with 45 percent of the vote, or 40 percent with a margin of at least 10 percentage points. If no candidate reaches any of those thresholds, the race will go to a runoff on Nov. 19 between the top two finishers.Even though Mr. Milei won the primary, he still claimed fraud, saying rivals stole his parties’ ballots from polling stations, preventing citizens from voting for him. Mr. Milei also said his party’s ballots were found in the trash at a school. His party did not provide any evidence.Mr. Milei said his party had complained to election officials, but election officials disputed that.“There was no complaint or challenge, nor was there any systematic ballot theft,” Argentina’s electoral court said in a statement. “We are concerned that such statements are made without accompanying legal filings to investigate.”Mr. Milei’s campaign said it had recruited 100,000 volunteers to monitor polling stations on Election Day. But in a television interview on Thursday, Mr. Milei said he was still worried about stolen votes.He claimed that the alleged fraud in the primaries had cost him at least several percentage points of support. “Some say two and a half points, others say three, and others say five,” he said. “Whatever the number is, it may be decisive.”Natalie Alcoba More

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      Another Setback for Rishi Sunak in a Local Election

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      Prime Minister Rishi Sunak’s Conservative Party is trailing the opposition Labour Party in opinion polls.Britain’s governing Conservative Party, which is trailing badly in the opinion polls, lost one of its safest parliamentary seats on Friday in a significant new setback for the prime minister, Rishi Sunak, who was also awaiting the result of another closely watched contest.Voting in the two Conservative strongholds of Tamworth and Mid Bedfordshire took place on Thursday to replace two of the party’s lawmakers — one of whom quit after an allegation of sexual assault — and came as Britain’s health care system faces acute strain and its economy stagnates amid high inflation.The first result, announced early Friday, from Tamworth, is a stinging blow to Mr. Sunak, who, since he became prime minister last year following the brief and disastrous leadership of Liz Truss, has failed to close a persistent double-digit deficit in the opinion polls against the opposition Labour Party. The stakes are high because Mr. Sunak must call a general election within the next 15 months.In Tamworth, northeast of Birmingham, the vote was to replace Chris Pincher, the former Conservative lawmaker who had represented the district. He resigned from Parliament after a drunken incident in which, it was alleged, he had groped two men. In the 2019 general election, Mr. Pincher won with a majority of 19,634. On Friday that was overturned when Sarah Edwards for Labour won 11,719 votes, and the Conservative candidate, Andrew Cooper, won 10,403.“Tonight the people of Tamworth have voted for Labour’s positive vision and a fresh start,” Ms. Edwards told her cheering supporters after the result. “They have sent a clear message to Rishi Sunak and the Conservatives that they have had enough of this failed government.”Keir Starmer, leader of the Labour Party, described the vote as “a phenomenal result that shows Labour is back in the service of working people and redrawing the political map.”In a statement, he added: “To those who have given us their trust, and those considering doing so, Labour will spend every day acting in your interests and focused on your priorities. Labour will give Britain its future back.”A result was also expected early Friday from the vote in Mid Bedfordshire, around 50 miles north of London, to replace Nadine Dorries, a former cabinet minister and prominent supporter of Boris Johnson, who quit as prime minister last year.Analysts caution against over-interpreting the results of these types of local contests — known as by-elections — where there is no prospect of the result changing the government, and voters often cast their ballots to register a protest against the governing party. Less than 36 percent of registered voters turned out to vote in Tamworth; in Mid Bedfordshire the number was higher, at 44 percent.Because the Conservatives won so convincingly at the last general election, in 2019, Labour still has an electoral mountain to climb if it is to win a clear majority the next time Britons are asked to decide who should govern them.Yet, the scale of the switch of votes does not bode well for Mr. Sunak, suggesting that even some of his Conservative Party’s more secure strongholds are no longer impregnable.Mr. Sunak was praised for restoring some measure of stability after Ms. Truss’s economic plans roiled the financial markets and she became the country’s shortest lived prime minister in history. But he has struggled to win over the British public after 13 years of Conservative government.In recent weeks, Mr. Sunak has tried to seize the political initiative with a series of eye-catching decision: scaling back climate change targets, canceling the second phase of a high-speed rail project, announcing new measures to phase out the sale of cigarettes to young people and proposing a shake-up the high school examination system.Little electoral reward appears to have flowed from these announcements, however, three of which were made at the Conservative Party’s annual conference in Manchester earlier this month.That meeting was distracted by a high-profile appearance by Ms. Truss, and by scarcely concealed jockeying from those who see themselves as contenders for the party leadership, should the Conservatives lose the general election.By contrast, Labour’s conference in Liverpool, the week after, presented a more unified and confident image of a party that sees itself as close to power.Friday’s results are the latest in a succession of election setbacks for Mr. Sunak. In July Labour won a by-election in Selby and Ainsty, in the north of England, overturning a Conservative majority of more than 20,000.Earlier this month, Labour unseated the Scottish National Party from the Rutherglen and Hamilton West district, in a result that underscored a revival of the main opposition party’s fortunes in Scotland. Success there during the next general election could significantly improve Labour’s prospects of forming the next government. More

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      Javier Milei and His 5 Cloned Dogs in Argentina’s Election

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      Javier Milei, a far-right libertarian, might soon be Argentina’s next president. He credits his cloned “four-legged children.”After finishing a surprising first in Argentina’s presidential primaries in August, Javier Milei grabbed a microphone in front of a raucous crowd and thanked Conan, Murray, Milton, Robert and Lucas.“Who else?” he said. “My four-legged children.”Mr. Milei, a far-right libertarian who is the favorite in Argentina’s presidential election on Sunday, would head to the country’s presidential offices, the Casa Rosada, not with a spouse and children, but with five mastiffs he has long called his children.He is, of course, speaking figuratively. Technically speaking, however, those five dogs are not traditional offspring of any animal. They are genetic copies of Mr. Milei’s former dog, also named Conan, and were created in a laboratory in upstate New York.Mr. Milei’s five cloned dogs have become objects of fascination in Argentina’s presidential election and a window into his unusual candidacy. For months the national debate has revolved around his ascent, his eccentric personality and his radical economic proposals — like eliminating Argentina’s central bank and replacing its currency with the U.S. dollar — to save the nation of 46 million from one of its worst financial crises in decades.Mr. Milei has made his original dog, Conan, named for the movie “Conan the Barbarian,” a central player in his back story, saying the dog saved his life and spent numerous Christmases alone with him when he felt abandoned by others.He has made the cloned dogs symbols of his libertarian ideals by naming four of them for three conservative American economists: Murray Rothbard, Milton Friedman and Robert Lucas.And at his rallies, he has held aloft paintings of his dogs, which he passes out to the crowd before picking up a roaring chain saw, his go-to metaphor for the deep cuts he wants to deliver to the Argentine government.A supporter holding a replica of a $100 bill featuring Mr. Milei with a chain saw. The tool is a symbol of the deep cuts Mr. Milei wants to make to the Argentine government.Sarah Pabst for The New York TimesMr. Milei has also signaled that cloning could find a place in his government. Last month he said that, if elected, he would appoint an Argentine scientist who has dedicated his career to cloning animals as the chairman of an influential national scientific council.“He is considered the national cloner,” Mr. Milei said of the scientist, Daniel Salamone. “This is the future.” Mr. Milei’s scientific beliefs, including denying humans’ role in climate change, have worried scientists.Mr. Milei is the front-runner in Sunday’s election, but polls suggest that he will not receive enough votes to win outright and avoid a runoff in November.Mr. Milei’s cloned dogs are also an example of a growing trend among wealthy pet owners that is raising tricky ethical questions.A handful of companies in the United States, China and South Korea have cloned hundreds of dogs since the first cloned canine in 2005. Barbra Streisand owns two clones of her Coton de Tulear, while Barry Diller and Diane von Furstenberg have three clones of their Jack Russell terriers.To clone his dogs, Mr. Milei hired PerPETuate, a company run by Ron Gillespie, 75, who got his start in the world of livestock insemination and now runs a “genetic preservation” firm from the Big Island of Hawaii.Mr. Gillespie said he received an email from Mr. Milei in 2014, saying he was interested in cloning Conan. “He said that this dog was his life,” Mr. Gillespie said.For $1,200, Mr. Milei sent a sample of Conan’s tissue to Mr. Gillespie’s business partners, scientists at Worcester Polytechnic Institute in Worcester, Mass., who used that tissue to grow cells full of Conan’s DNA and then cryogenically freeze them. (Some cells remain frozen in Worcester.)The website of PerPETuate prominently features Mr. Milei’s cloned dogs.In 2018, after Conan died, Mr. Milei reached out again. He was ready to pay the $50,000, which was the cost of a procedure that would guarantee him at least one clone.Cloning one dog usually requires more than 100 eggs — or about a year’s worth of eggs from five to 10 canines — which are surgically harvested from donor dogs, Mr. Gillespie said.Dog-cloning technology is largely the same since Dolly the sheep became the first mammal clone in 1997. Scientists remove the nucleus from each donor egg cell, wiping them clean of all their DNA. Into those empty eggs, the scientists insert the cells full of DNA of the animal being cloned.“Then we stimulate the egg cell with a shot of electricity, and that forms a one-cell embryo that immediately begins to multiply,” Mr. Gillespie said.Ten to 15 of those embryos — based fully on the DNA from the dog being cloned — are then implanted into the uterus of a surrogate dog.Some bioethicists and animal-welfare groups question the ethics of pet cloning, both for its use of animals to donate eggs and carry cloned fetuses, as well as the fact that there are already millions of unwanted pets.Jessica Pierce, a bioethicist who studies the relationship between humans and dogs, has said cloning contributes to the creation of “a canine underclass” of surrogates that live sometimes difficult lives to produce clones. “I don’t think it’s too strong to call what we do to reproductive labor dogs a form of incarceration,” she said.Pet cloning companies reject that characterization, saying many surrogate dogs are adopted by loving families.Ms. Pierce said cloning also destroys more embryos than typical dog pregnancies. She said that seemingly puts it at odds with the beliefs of Mr. Milei, who has promised to try to ban abortion because he says life begins at fertilization.Mr. Milei’s campaign declined to comment or make him available for an interview.To clone Mr. Milei’s dogs, Mr. Gillespie contracted ViaGen Pets, based outside Austin, Texas, the only American company cloning dogs. ViaGen declined to say how many eggs it used to clone Conan.ViaGen said that in nearly three out of four cases, cloning a dog produces just one clone.In Mr. Milei’s case, in 2018, it produced five.“He was ecstatic,” Mr. Gillespie said. Once the clones arrived in Argentina, one began responding to “Conan” and seemed to enjoy the same television show as Mr. Milei’s previous dog, so Mr. Milei named the clone Conan, Mr. Gillespie said Mr. Milei told him.Conan “is literally a son to me,” Mr. Milei told an Argentine news site in 2018. The other four clones “are like my grandchildren.”He also has said the dogs are a handful. “My house is like Kosovo,” he said on television in 2018. “In two weeks, they’ve eaten almost four armchairs.” Five years later, he has said the largest of the pack weighs 220 pounds.Mr. Milei’s cloned dogs are a window into his unusual candidacy — and an example of a growing trend among wealthy pet owners that is raising tricky ethical questions.Marcelo Dubini/CarasOn the campaign trail, Mr. Milei has largely kept the dogs at a day care, out of sight. But they have remained a part of the debate.Sergio Massa, Argentina’s economic minister who is polling just behind Mr. Milei in Sunday’s vote, criticized Mr. Milei’s dismissal of global warming by saying that parents are worried about the planet’s future, unlike those “who speak to their dogs like they were their kids.”Argentine news outlets have also reported that Mr. Milei has privately said that he has received strategic advice from his dogs.When asked whether he, in fact, takes advice from his dogs, Mr. Milei has remained coy.“What I do inside my house is my problem,” he told the Spanish newspaper El País. At the closing event of his campaign on Wednesday night, he called his dogs “the best strategists in the world.”Celia Melamed, an Argentine veterinarian who runs a workshop on communicating with animals, said one of her students has been Karina Milei, Mr. Milei’s sister and campaign manager.Ms. Melamed said she can feel the emotions of animals through a sort of metaphysical connection. “If I connect with an animal and it’s afraid, I feel the fear in my body,” she said. “It seems esoteric, and perhaps it is, because so far science has not dealt with this.”Mr. Gillespie, the cloning entrepreneur in Hawaii, said that since learning on Facebook that his client was a politician, he had watched Mr. Milei’s rise with fascination.“As I tell my wife,” he said, “I don’t have a vote in the Argentine election, but I do have five dogs in the race.”Lucía Cholakian Herrera More

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      Los cinco clones de la elección argentina

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      Javier Milei, un candidato libertario de extrema derecha, podría ser el próximo presidente de Argentina. Él le da crédito a sus “hijitos de cuatro patas” clonados.Después de alcanzar un sorprendente primer lugar en las elecciones primarias presidenciales de Argentina en agosto, Javier Milei tomó un micrófono frente a una ruidosa multitud y le agradeció a Conan, Murray, Milton, Robert y Lucas.“Y se imaginarán a quienes también”, dijo. “¡A mis hijitos de cuatro patas!”.Milei, un libertario de extrema derecha que es el favorito en las elecciones presidenciales de Argentina del domingo, no se mudaría a la Casa Rosada —la residencia presidencial del país— con pareja e hijos, sino con cinco mastines a los que desde hace tiempo considera como sus hijos.Habla, por supuesto, en sentido figurado. Técnicamente hablando, esos cinco perros no son descendientes tradicionales de ningún animal. Son copias genéticas de un perro que tuvo Milei, que también se llamaba Conan, y fueron creados en un laboratorio ubicado al norte del estado de Nueva York.Los cinco perros clonados se han convertido en objeto de fascinación en las elecciones presidenciales de Argentina, que durante meses han girado en torno al ascenso de Milei, su excéntrica personalidad y sus radicales propuestas económicas —como eliminar el banco central de Argentina y sustituir su moneda por el dólar estadounidense— para salvar la país de 46 millones de habitantes de una de sus peores crisis financieras en décadas.Milei ha hecho de su perro original, Conan, llamado así por la película Conan el Bárbaro, un personaje central de su narrativa personal, al decir que le salvó la vida y pasó una decena de Navidades solo con él cuando se sintió abandonado por otras personas.Ha convertido a los perros clonados en símbolos de sus ideales libertarios, al bautizar a cuatro de ellos con el nombre de tres economistas conservadores estadounidenses: Murray Rothbard, Milton Friedman y Robert Lucas.Y en sus mítines ha sostenido cuadros de sus perros, que reparte entre la multitud antes de tomar una motosierra estruendosa, su metáfora predilecta de los profundos recortes que quiere asestar al gobierno argentino.Un partidario sostiene una réplica de un billete de 100 dólares que muestra a Milei con una motosierra. La herramienta es un símbolo de los profundos recortes que Milei quiere hacerle al gobierno argentino.Sarah Pabst para The New York TimesMilei también ha señalado que la clonación podría tener cabida en su gobierno. El mes pasado dijo que, si ganaba las elecciones, nombraría presidente de un influyente consejo científico nacional a un científico argentino que ha dedicado su carrera a la clonación de animales.“Es considerado el clonador nacional”, dijo Milei sobre el científico, Daniel Salamone. “Es el futuro”. Las creencias científicas de Milei, incluida la negación del papel de los humanos en el cambio climático, han preocupado a los investigadores.Aunque Milei es el favorito, es posible que no logre los votos necesarios para evitar una segunda vuelta en noviembre.Los perros clonados de Milei son una ventana abierta a su insólita candidatura, y un ejemplo de una tendencia creciente entre adinerados propietarios de mascotas que está planteando delicadas cuestiones éticas.Un grupo de empresas de Estados Unidos, China y Corea del Sur han clonado cientos de perros desde la primera clonación canina en 2005. Barbra Streisand es dueña de dos clones de su Coton de Tulear, mientras que Barry Diller y Diane von Furstenberg tienen tres clones de su Jack Russell terrier.Para clonar a sus perros, Milei contrató a PerPETuate, una empresa dirigida por Ron Gillespie, de 75 años, que empezó en el mundo de la inseminación de ganado y ahora dirige una empresa de “preservación genética” desde Hawái.Gillespie dijo que recibió un correo electrónico de Milei en 2014, diciendo que estaba interesado en clonar a Conan. “Dijo que este perro era su vida”, dijo Gillespie.Por 1200 dólares, Milei envió una muestra de tejido de Conan a los socios comerciales de Gillespie, científicos de la Universidad Politécnica de Worcester, en Worcester, Massachusetts, que usaron ese tejido para cultivar células llenas del ADN de Conan y luego congelarlas criogénicamente. (Algunas células permanecen congeladas en Worcester).El sitio web de PerPETuate destaca los perros clonados de Milei.En 2018, tras la muerte de Conan, Milei volvió a llamarlo. Estaba dispuesto a pagar los 50.000 dólares del procedimiento que le garantizaría, al menos, un clon.La clonación de un perro normalmente requiere más de 100 óvulos —o el equivalente a un año de producción de óvulos de cinco a 10 perras— que se extraen quirúrgicamente de donantes, dijo Gillespie.La tecnología de clonación de perros es prácticamente la misma desde que la oveja Dolly se convirtió en el primer mamífero clonado en 1997. Los científicos extraen el núcleo de cada óvulo donado, limpiándolos de todo su ADN. En esos óvulos vacíos, los científicos insertan las células llenas de ADN del animal que se va a clonar.“Luego estimulamos el óvulo con un golpe de electricidad, que forma un embrión unicelular que empieza a multiplicarse inmediatamente”, explica Gillespie.Entre 10 y 15 de esos embriones —basados totalmente en el ADN del perro clonado— se implantan en el útero de una perra que será la madre subrogada.Algunos especialistas en bioética y grupos de defensa de los animales cuestionan la ética de la clonación de mascotas, tanto por el uso de animales para donar óvulos y gestar fetos clonados, como por el hecho de que ya hay millones de mascotas no deseadas.Jessica Pierce, bioeticista que estudia la relación entre humanos y perros, ha dicho que la clonación contribuye a la creación de “una subclase canina” que a veces experimenta vidas difíciles para producir clones. “No creo que sea demasiado fuerte calificar lo que hacemos con los perros reproductores como una forma de encarcelamiento”, afirma.Las empresas de clonación de mascotas rechazan esa descripción, y afirman que muchas perras que ejercen de madres subrogadas son adoptadas por familias cariñosas.Pierce dijo que la clonación también destruye más embriones que los embarazos típicos de perros, lo que parece contraponerse con las creencias de Milei, que ha prometido intentar prohibir el aborto porque dice que la vida comienza en la fecundación.La campaña de Milei se abstuvo de hacer comentarios y de permitir una entrevista con el candidato.Para clonar a los perros de Milei, Gillespie contrató a ViaGen Pets, con sede a las afueras de Austin, Texas, la única empresa estadounidense que clona perros. ViaGen no quiso decir cuántos óvulos usó para clonar a Conan.ViaGen dijo que en casi tres de cada cuatro casos, la clonación de un perro produce un solo clon.En el caso de Milei, en 2018, produjo cinco.“Estaba eufórico”, dijo Gillespie. Cuando los clones llegaron a Argentina, uno comenzó a responder al nombre de “Conan” y parecía disfrutar del mismo programa de televisión que el perro anterior, por lo que Milei lo bautizó como Conan, dijo Gillespie según lo que le contó Milei.Conan es “literalmente un hijo para mí”, dijo Milei a un sitio de noticias argentino en 2018. Los otros cuatro clones “son como mis nietos”.También ha dicho que los perros son revoltosos. “Mi casa es Kosovo”, dijo poco después de recibir a los animales. “En dos semanas, se comieron casi cuatro sillones”. Cinco años después, ha dicho que el mayor de la camada pesa casi 100 kilos.Los perros clonados de Milei son una ventana abierta a su insólita candidatura, y un ejemplo de una tendencia creciente entre adinerados propietarios de mascotas que está planteando delicadas cuestiones éticas.Marcelo Dubini/CarasDurante la campaña, Milei ha mantenido a los perros en una guardería, apartados del ojo público. Pero siguen formando parte del debate.Sergio Massa, ministro de Economía de Argentina, que se sitúa justo por detrás de Milei en la votación del domingo, criticó la negación de Milei del papel de los humanos en el cambio climático, al decir que los padres están preocupados por el futuro del planeta, a diferencia de quienes “le hablan a los perros tratándolos como hijos”.Los medios de comunicación argentinos también han publicado que Milei ha dicho en privado que ha recibido consejos estratégicos de sus perros.Cuando se le ha preguntado si, de hecho, recibe consejos de sus perros, Milei se ha mostrado esquivo.“Lo que yo haga puertas adentro de mi casa es problema mío,” declaró al diario español El País. En el evento de cierre de su campaña, el miércoles por la noche, llamó a sus perros “los mejores estrategas del mundo.”Celia Melamed, veterinaria argentina que dirige un taller de comunicación con animales, dijo que una de sus alumnas ha sido Karina Milei, hermana del candidato y directora de su campaña.Melamed dijo que puede sentir las emociones de los animales a través de una especie de conexión metafísica. “Si conecto con un animal y tiene miedo, siento miedo en el cuerpo”, dijo. “Parece esotérico, y quizás lo sea”.Gillespie, el empresario de la clonación en Hawái, dijo que desde que se enteró de que su cliente era un político tras añadirlo como amigo en Facebook, ha observado el ascenso de Milei con fascinación.“Como le digo a mi esposa”, dijo, “no tengo voto en las elecciones argentinas, pero sí cinco perros en la contienda”.Lucía Cholakian Herrera More

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      Venezuela Pledges Small Steps Toward Fair Elections Next Year

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      The agreement signed on Tuesday by the country’s authoritarian government and the opposition would not allow all candidates to run.The government of President Nicolás Maduro of Venezuela and the country’s opposition resumed talks on Tuesday designed to move toward free and fair elections, though the agreement that was announced fell short of what human rights activists and the U.S. government are ultimately seeking.Hopes were high that, as part of the agreement, Mr. Maduro would allow opposition candidates already disqualified by his government to participate in the 2024 presidential vote in exchange for the lifting of sanctions on Venezuela’s vital oil industry.Doing so would be a critical move toward a credible race, given that the front-runner in an opposition primary election set for Sunday, María Corina Machado, is barred from running in the general election.But the agreements signed on Tuesday, during a ceremony on the Caribbean island of Barbados, were vague. While they included commitments to allow international election observers and access to the news media in 2024, there were few other concrete promises. Experts say it is unlikely that the United States will fully lift sanctions if Ms. Machado is not allowed to run.“We are going toward the supreme objective of lifting the sanctions,” said Jorge Rodríguez, the president of Venezuela’s legislature, at the ceremony. But “if you received an administrative disqualification,” he added, “then you cannot be a candidate.”Even before an official announcement, some Venezuela experts expressed skepticism that the agreement would lead to real political change.“It’s a minimalist deal that will not lead to free and fair elections,” said Phil Gunson, an analyst with International Crisis Group who lives in the country’s capital, Caracas. But he said, it “is the best available in the circumstances. It allows Maduro to hang on to power unless something really dramatic happens. Baby steps, really.”He added, “The Maduro government has a history of failing to abide by agreements it signs.”Secretary of State Antony J. Blinken, in a joint statement with his British, Canadian and E.U. counterparts, welcomed the agreement as a “necessary step” in the “restoration of democracy in Venezuela.”“We continue to call for the unconditional release of all those unjustly detained, the independence of the electoral process and judicial institutions, freedom of expression including for members of the press, and respect for human and political rights,” the statement added.Mr. Maduro came to power in 2013, after the death of President Hugo Chávez, the founder of the country’s socialist-inspired revolution. Under Mr. Maduro, Venezuela, once among the richest countries in Latin America, has witnessed an extraordinary economic decline, leading to a humanitarian crisis that has caused widespread migration.President Nicolás Maduro claimed victory in a 2018 election widely viewed as fraudulent and that led to stricter U.S. sanctions.Meridith Kohut for The New York TimesMore than seven million Venezuelans have fled the country of roughly 28 million people, and in recent years, hundreds of thousands have begun trekking by foot to the United States.Mr. Maduro claimed victory in a 2018 election widely viewed as fraudulent. In response, the U.S. government significantly tightened sanctions on the country’s oil industry, Venezuela’s key source of revenue, a move that exacerbated the economic crisis and isolated Mr. Maduro from much of the world.To help the economy, Mr. Maduro needs sanctions to be lifted. At the same time, the opposition wants him to set competitive conditions for the next presidential election that would give it a legitimate shot at winning.The two sides, however, have been at an impasse over how to achieve these goals, and Mr. Maduro has seemed unwilling to do anything he believes would risk his grip on power.In November, as a sign of its openness to lifting sanctions in exchange for ensuring fair elections, the United States granted the oil company Chevron a license for a limited expansion of energy operations in Venezuela, a small step toward the country’s possible re-entry into the international oil market.The Biden administration is under pressure to ensure that oil prices remain stable going into next year’s presidential election. The threat of a broader conflict in the Middle East combined with ongoing disruptions to Russian energy exports threaten to fan another episode of inflation and potentially cause gasoline prices to rise in the coming months.But even after lifting sanctions, it would still take years and billions of dollars of investment to increase oil production enough to lower prices, said Francisco Monaldi, an expert on Venezuelan energy at Rice University in Houston.He said the Biden administration was most likely motivated more by trying to stem the flow of Venezuelan migrants to the U.S.-Mexico border than by driving down oil prices in the short term.Mr. Maduro’s government is being investigated by the International Criminal Court for possible crimes against humanity committed since 2017, including torture and persecution on political grounds.Isayen Herrera More

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      Gobierno de Venezuela y oposición firman un acuerdo

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      El acuerdo firmado el martes por el gobierno autoritario del país y la oposición no permitiría que todos los candidatos puedan postularse.El gobierno del presidente venezolano Nicolás Maduro, y la oposición del país, reanudaron el martes las conversaciones para avanzar hacia unas elecciones libres y justas, aunque el acuerdo que se anunció tiene limitaciones en los temas que los activistas de derechos humanos y el gobierno de Estados Unidos buscan en última instancia.Había esperanzas de que, como parte del acuerdo, Maduro permitiera que los candidatos de la oposición que han sido inhabilitados por su gobierno participen en las elecciones presidenciales de 2024, a cambio del levantamiento de las sanciones impuestas a la vital industria petrolera venezolana.Esto sería un paso fundamental hacia una contienda creíble porque a María Corina Machado, la candidata favorita de las elecciones primarias de la oposición que se realizarán el domingo, le prohibieron postularse a las elecciones generales.El acuerdo firmado el martes, durante una ceremonia en la isla caribeña de Barbados, es vago. Aunque incluye el compromiso de permitir la presencia de observadores electorales internacionales y el acceso a los medios de comunicación en 2024, hace pocas promesas concretas. Los expertos afirman que es poco probable que Estados Unidos levante las sanciones si no se permite que Machado se postule a las elecciones.“Vamos hacia el objetivo supremo de levantamiento de las sanciones”, dijo Jorge Rodríguez, presidente de la Asamblea Nacional de Venezuela, en la ceremonia. Y agregó: “Si usted recibió una inhabilitación administrativa por el órgano que le corresponde, desde el punto de vista constitucional legal, que es la Contraloría General de la República, pues tampoco puede ser candidato”.Incluso antes de un anuncio oficial, algunos expertos en Venezuela expresaron su escepticismo de que el acuerdo lograra un cambio político real.“Es un acuerdo minimalista que no logrará unas elecciones libres y justas”, dijo Phil Gunson, analista del International Crisis Group que vive en Caracas, la capital del país. Pero “es lo mejor que hay en estas circunstancias. Le permite a Maduro aferrarse al poder, a menos que ocurra algo realmente dramático. En realidad, son pequeños pasos”.Y añadió: “El gobierno de Maduro tiene un historial de incumplimiento de los acuerdos que firma”.Maduro llegó al poder en 2013, tras la muerte del presidente Hugo Chávez, el fundador de la revolución de inspiración socialista que ha gobernado el país. Bajo el mandato de Maduro, Venezuela, que fue uno de los países más ricos de América Latina, ha experimentado un declive económico extraordinario, generando una crisis humanitaria que ha provocado una migración masiva.El presidente Nicolás Maduro reclamó la victoria en unas elecciones de 2018 ampliamente consideradas fraudulentas y que originaron sanciones más estrictas por parte de Estados Unidos.Meridith Kohut para The New York TimesMás de siete millones de venezolanos han huido del país, cuya población es de unos 28 millones de habitantes. Además, en los últimos años, cientos de miles de personas han emprendido el viaje hacia Estados Unidos a pie.En 2018, Maduro se declaró vencedor en unas elecciones ampliamente consideradas como fraudulentas. En respuesta, el gobierno de Estados Unidos endureció significativamente las sanciones contra la industria petrolera del país, la principal fuente de ingresos de Venezuela, una medida que exacerbó la crisis económica y aisló a Maduro de gran parte del mundo.Para mejorar la economía, Maduro necesita que se levanten las sanciones. Al mismo tiempo, la oposición quiere que establezca condiciones competitivas para las próximas elecciones presidenciales con el fin de tener una oportunidad legítima de ganar.Sin embargo, ambas partes no han logrado estos objetivos, y pareciera que Maduro no está dispuesto a hacer nada que crea que puede poner en riesgo su control sobre el poder.En noviembre, como señal de su disposición a levantar las sanciones a cambio de garantizar unas elecciones justas, Estados Unidos concedió a la petrolera Chevron una licencia para una expansión limitada de las operaciones energéticas en Venezuela, un avance modesto hacia la posible reincorporación del país al mercado petrolero internacional.El gobierno de Biden se encuentra bajo presión para garantizar que los precios del petróleo se mantengan estables de cara a las elecciones presidenciales del próximo año. La amenaza de un conflicto más amplio en Medio Oriente, aunada a las actuales interrupciones de las exportaciones energéticas rusas, amenazan con avivar otro episodio de inflación y provocar una potencial subida de los precios de la gasolina en los próximos meses.Pero, incluso después de levantar las sanciones, se necesitarían años y miles de millones de dólares de inversión para aumentar la producción de petróleo lo suficiente como para bajar los precios, dijo Francisco Monaldi, experto en energía venezolana de la Universidad Rice en Houston.Monaldi cree que lo más probable es que el gobierno de Biden centre sus motivaciones en tratar de frenar el flujo de migrantes venezolanos hacia la frontera entre Estados Unidos y México, en vez de hacer bajar los precios del petróleo a corto plazo.El gobierno de Maduro está siendo investigado por la Corte Penal Internacional por posibles crímenes de lesa humanidad cometidos desde 2017, lo que incluye torturas y persecuciones por motivos políticos.Isayen Herrera More

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      Poland’s Governing Party Looks Set to Be Ousted

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      An expected liberal coalition would probably reverse deeply conservative policies at home and diminish Poland’s role abroad as a beacon for right-wing groups.It boiled down to a choice between two different visions of the future: one dominated by nationalism, traditional Catholic norms and the defense of Polish sovereignty; the other by promises to “bring Poland back to Europe” and the liberal democratic values espoused by the European Union.In the end, after a long, vicious election campaign in a highly polarized country, opponents of the nationalist governing party won a clear majority of seats in a pivotal general election held on Sunday, according to final official results Tuesday.That victory opened the way for a potentially drastic shift away from Poland’s deeply conservative policies at home and its role abroad as a beacon for right-wing groups and politicians opposed to liberal values.The prospect of an end to years of testy relations between Warsaw and Brussels delighted Polish liberals and those elsewhere worried by what had, for a time, seemed like a rising tide of right-wing, and sometimes left-wing, populism in Poland and across Europe.The election, cast by both sides of the political divide as Poland’s most consequential vote since voters rejected communism in 1989, offered a multitude of parties from the far right to the progressive left.“These are absolutely historic moments,” Donald Tusk, Civic Coalition’s leader, told euphoric supporters in Warsaw on Tuesday. “The weather has changed,” he added before repeating a line from a popular song often used during the campaign: “It’s time for a happy Poland.”Held just two weeks after voters in neighboring Slovakia handed victory to a Russia-friendly party tainted by corruption, the Polish election was closely watched as a gauge of Europe’s direction.It was also seen as a measure of whether Hungary, increasingly authoritarian under Prime Minister Viktor Orban, would remain an idiosyncratic outlier or become the standard-bearer of a growing cause whose friends extend beyond ideological allies like the TV personality Tucker Carlson, a big fan of Mr. Orban, to include European governments.Hungary and Poland for a time were close partners, leading what they promoted as a European renaissance rooted in Christian values and national sovereignty, but they parted ways over the war in Ukraine. Mr. Orban tilted toward Moscow while Poland offered robust support for Ukraine, though that position wobbled somewhat during the election campaign.Official results confirming exit polls released on Sunday cast gloom over the governing party, Law and Justice, which had fought the election on promises to save Poland from European bureaucrats pushing “L.G.B.T. ideology” and what it denounced as Germany’s hegemonic aspirations.A final tally of votes released on Tuesday by the electoral commission gave Civic Coalition, the main opposition party, and two smaller groups also opposed to the Law and Justice party — Third Way and New Left — 248 seats in the 460-member Sejm, the more powerful lower house of Parliament.Together they won 53.7 percent of the vote after a record turnout of about 74 percent, compared with 35.4 percent of ballots cast for Law and Justice. That tally would most likely reduce Law and Justice’s presence in the Sejm by 33 seats.Arkadiusz Mularczyk, of the Law and Justice party, acknowledged defeat, saying that “we cannot be offended by democracy” and that, “after eight difficult years in government, perhaps it is time for the opposition.”Poland remains deeply divided by generation and geography, with Law and Justice sweeping poorer rural areas in the south and east while Civic Coalition, its main rival, strengthened its grip on urban centers like Warsaw and richer areas in the center and west.But, reversing a trend across Europe toward increased youth disenchantment with electoral politics of all ideological shades, Poles under 29 voted in larger numbers than voters over 60. That was despite the two main rival camps being led by veterans — Jaroslaw Kaczynski, 74, the Law and Justice chairman, and Mr. Tusk, 66, the leader of Civic Coalition, both former prime ministers.The opposition also won a large majority of seats in the 100-member Senate, the upper house, but its victory in both chambers of Poland’s Parliament, though a big symbolic boost for supporters of liberal democracy and European integration, will be crimped by its having to work with a Polish president loyal to Law and Justice.The president, Andrzej Duda, an outspoken critic of Mr. Tusk in the past, will stay in office until elections in 2025 and, until then, can veto legislation passed by his political opponents in Parliament. Mr. Duda is now responsible for asking someone to form a government, a task that will probably fall, at least initially, to a member of Parliament from Law and Justice, which won more votes than any other single party. Without a majority, Law and Justice is unlikely to succeed and Mr. Duda will need to turn to the opposition.Anatol Magdziarz contributed reporting. More

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      In Legal Peril at Home, Trump Turns to a U.K. Court for Vindication

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      On a day when he lashed out at a federal judge in Washington, the former president asked a judge in London to let his lawsuit over the notorious Steele dossier go forward.Donald J. Trump was thousands of miles away from the vaulted chamber in Britain’s Royal Courts of Justice on Monday. But his words echoed in a lawsuit he has filed in London against Christopher Steele, a former British spy whose dossier of unproven links between Mr. Trump and Russia caused a political uproar back in 2017.“The inaccurate personal data in the Dossier has, and continues, to cause me significant damage and distress,” the former president said in a signed statement circulated by his lawyers. “A judgment of the English court on this issue will be an immense relief to me as it will completely confirm the true position to the public.”Mr. Trump’s words came on a day of trans-Atlantic legal maneuvering. At home, he lashed out against a judge in Washington who imposed a limited gag order on him in the federal case over his efforts to overturn the 2020 election. In London, lawyers for Mr. Trump invoked their client’s testimony to argue that Mr. Steele’s firm, Orbis Business Intelligence, had breached British data protection laws.This is the first case Mr. Trump has filed in Britain related to the dossier, published just before he took office, and it appears calculated to find more favorable legal terrain after a federal judge in Florida threw out a lawsuit last year that Mr. Trump filed against Mr. Steele, Hillary Clinton, and others, related to the Russia allegations.Mr. Trump’s lawyer, Hugh Tomlinson, said his client would give evidence in court if the justice, Karen Steyn, agreed to let the case go to trial. But a lawyer for Orbis argued that the court should throw out the case because the statute of limitations had expired on Mr. Trump’s claims of data protection violations.Antony White, the lawyer for Orbis, said any damage to Mr. Trump’s reputation resulted from the publication of the dossier by Buzzfeed in January 2017, over which Mr. Steele had no control. He also noted that Mr. Trump only brought his case in Britain after his case against Mr. Steele was dismissed in the United States.Mr. White suggested it was a pattern of frivolous litigation against Mr. Steele. He was in the courtroom, taking copious notes and nodding or shaking his head as his lawyers, and Mr. Trump’s, made their arguments on the first day of a two-day hearing.Christopher Steele, center, a former British spy whose dossier of unproven links between Mr. Trump and Russia caused a political uproar in 2017, leaving court after a hearing on Monday in London.Aaron Chown/Press Association, via Associated Press“The claim has no real prospect of success and there is no other compelling reason why it should proceed to a trial,” Mr. Steele’s lawyers said in a filing. “In any event, the claim should be struck out as an abuse of process because it has been brought for an illegitimate and vexatious purpose.”To be sure, none of the inflammatory allegations in Mr. Steele’s dossier — including reports that Mr. Trump made illicit payments to Russian officials or cavorted with prostitutes on visits to Russia — have been substantiated. The F.B.I. concluded that one of the key allegations — that Mr. Trump’s lawyer, Michael Cohen, had met with Russian officials in Prague during the campaign — was false.But Mr. Trump said that Mr. Steele has continued to argue that the dossier was accurate. He cited a post on X, formerly known as Twitter, last May, in which Mr. Steele said, “Our Trump-Russia reporting has not been ‘discredited.’ In fact its main tenets continue to hold up well and almost no detail has been disproven.”Mr. Trump denied that he had subjected Mr. Steele to what Mr. Steele called a “barrage of abuse and threats,” saying he had no role in reported cyberattacks on Mr. Steele’s business or in the publication of the home addresses of his children. Mr. Trump also claimed that Mr. Steele had impugned the reputation of his eldest daughter, Ivanka.“My daughter, Ivanka, is completely irrelevant to this claim and any mention of her only serves to distract this court from the defendant and Mr. Steele’s reckless behavior,” he said in his statement. “Any inference or allegation that Mr. Steele makes about my relationship with my daughter is untrue and disgraceful.”It was not clear what statements by Mr. Steele that Mr. Trump was citing. Mr. Steele exchanged emails with Ms. Trump a decade before her father ran for president, according to ABC News and CNN.Mr. Trump’s lawyer, Mr. Tomlinson, acknowledged his client was not given to subtlety or precision in his statements, and that Mr. Trump had a long history of litigation in the United States, not all of it successful. He uses language “more familiar to U.S. than U.K. political discourse,” he said.“It’s uncontroversial for me to say President Trump is a controversial figure,” he said. “He often expresses himself in very strong language.”But Mr. Tomlinson said Mr. Trump was entitled to be vindicated, and to receive at least nominal damages, for the reputational harm he had suffered from allegations that he said were entirely erroneous. Though Mr. Steele did not publish the dossier, he said, it would not have existed if he had not produced it.He pointed to a ruling in 2020, in which two Russian business moguls, Mikhail Fridman and Petr Aven, won damages of 18,000 pounds ($22,900) each from Mr. Steele’s firm after they argued that allegations about them in the dossier violated data protection laws.The court ruled that Orbis had “failed to take reasonable steps to verify” claims that Mr. Fridman and Mr. Aven, who controlled Alfa Bank, had made illicit payments to President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia, though the judge dismissed several other claims.Mr. Steele has not denied sharing the dossier with journalists. But he rejected the contention that he has sought to promote its contents since then.“I declined to provide any media interviews for three-and-a-half years after the publication of the dossier by Buzzfeed, despite being asked multiple times by major international media organizations,” he testified in a witness statement. “If I had wanted to ‘promote’ the dossier as Mr. Trump suggests, I obviously would have taken up those media opportunities.” More