The UCR is pushing for vacancies in the judiciary and continues the fight for Supreme Court judges.

While Peronism and the government continue their duel over the two vacant seats on the Supreme Court, the Radical Party is beginning to appear on the scene and has begun calling on the government to move forward with the appointment of judges, prosecutors, and public defenders to fill the pending vacancies in the judiciary.

It is clear that the discussion to fill the vacancies in the Judiciary is part of the negotiations that the Casa Rosada must undertake with the opposition if it intends to normalize the composition of the Court after the attempt to appoint Ariel Lijo and Manuel García-Mansilla by decree failed, and their nominations were rejected in the Senate.

For now, President Javier Milei has not mentioned any new candidates to replace Elena Highton de Nolasco and Juan Carlos Maqueda, who left the Supreme Court upon reaching retirement age.

In this context, Senator Maximiliano Abad placed the situation of the Federal Judiciary on the agenda, given the number of vacancies, and emphasized the importance of moving forward with appointments and strengthening infrastructure to ensure the proper functioning of the accusatory system.

Specifically, the senator referred to the 184 vacant national and federal judgeships , which, if the prosecutor's offices and public defender's offices are included, exceeds 200 positions, not to mention the vacancies left by retiring judicial officials. Furthermore, on this point, the Radical Party also calls for the implementation of the accusatory system.

In the recent management report presented by Chief of Staff Guillermo Francos , it was announced that the accusatory system should have been implemented in the districts of Mar del Plata, Bahía Blanca, and Buenos Aires City. In the case of the City, it should be clarified that the government has until August 2025. This reform is key to addressing cases related to drug trafficking. "If there is no infrastructure and resources to strengthen the justice system, all the government's announcements are a non-starter because the cases will not advance," a legislator with access to the Comodoro Py courts warned Clarín .

Congress suspects the government's intention is to begin sending Senate resolution requests in reduced batches . This was reflected in the report presented by Francos, which specifies that requests for the appointment of judges and prosecutors in Santa Fe, Rosario, and San Nicolás will be sent. In total, there would be about 30 vacancies to fill.

But the mission isn't simple because these positions are part of a political negotiation. "The government must reach agreements to appoint judges and prosecutors, otherwise this situation will end up being a profit-making scheme for the criminal lawyers who are supposed to defend the people, and the cases will become bogged down," he noted.

However, the underlying issue remains the composition of the Supreme Court of Justice. According to legislative sources, the Peronist party, which holds the key to unblocking the appointment of judges and prosecutors, maintains its plan to move forward with a comprehensive agreement that includes the two vacancies on the highest court as well as the remaining vacant positions in the Judiciary.

Underground talks between José Mayans , head of the Unión por la Patria bloc, and the ruling party appear to be continuing, but it has not been revealed whether they will reach an agreement. In this context, the Peronist party insisted that they are open to dialogue, although they maintain Cristina Kirchner 's maxim that one of the two unfilled seats on the Court must go to a woman proposed by the majority opposition.

Furthermore, the Union for the Homeland is beginning to rule out the possibility of moving forward with an expansion of the Court, which was one of the options the negotiators had raised to unblock the negotiations, with a composition of seven justices. But according to reports, Santiago Caputo , the government's star advisor, is not entirely convinced by the proposal because he suspects Milei could be diminished by the power of the highest court.

Among the allies, there is another interpretation of the Casa Rosada's move. "We are heading into an electoral process, and the ruling party will wait for a change in the composition of Congress with the intention of adding more legislators to define the next steps and avoid repeating the mistake of Lijo and García-Mansilla," said a senator from the dialogue group, who asserted that "no one wants to talk about the Court now."