The scenarios that open after the ruling of the Supreme Court for the Co-participation

While the national government and eighteen provincial leaders refine the judicial strategy with which they will respond to the precautionary measure of the Supreme Court that benefited the management of Horacio Rodríguez Larreta in the discussion for co-participating funds, in some supreme offices they slide ironies in advance, they fight, and almost take it for granted that whatever is proposed will be rejected. For the time being, what the Executive Power has announced is that it will challenge the supreme courts and that it will present a request to revoke its own decision (it is called "in extremis" revocation), something that is not provided for in any code but that was applied certain time. All this can be useful to buy time -something key in the realm of lawsuits-, and it will also depend on how long the court takes to respond (for now there are days left for the fair) and on other proposals to the contrary that the Buenos Aires government would present to claim the execution of the ruling, for which it announced that it could request an embargo. Then will come the other question that was hinted at: the possibility that the national State ignore court directives. It will not be the first time that someone ignores a sentence. There are several precedents, especially from provincial states and Congress. It will not be the first time that someone ignores a sentence. There are several precedents, especially from provincial states and Congress. It will not be the first time that someone ignores a sentence. There are several precedents, especially from provincial states and Congress.

A notable effect generated by the Court is that it speaks of the precautionary measure as if there were already a definitive resolution on the substantive discussion regarding the decrees and regulations that established the percentage of co-participation required for the transfer of security functions to the Buenos aires city. Deferring that sentence is part of the political game of the Supreme Court that granted a favorable decision to a presidential candidate from Together for Change and at the same time enabled a margin to grow a virtual conflict of politicians and powers where they insist on presenting themselves as those who they have the upper hand. Of course there are nuances within the court, but there is no doubt that the majority --Horacio Rosatti, Carlos Rosenkrantz and Juan Carlos Maqueda-- is in opposition to the government of Alberto Fernández.

* The national government is preparing proposals before the Court: it announced the recusal of the members of the highest court and a request to revoke its own sentence. Logic indicates that both issues should be resolved by co-judges, not by the defendants themselves, but the bets at the Palace of Justice say that they would resolve themselves, as they did in recent times in the face of removal requests. The revocation of their own decisions is something exceptional, in the face of gross errors or substantial failures that may lead to situations of injustice. The usual thing is that it is rejected (the PRO, for example, at the time tried it against the Media Law, and it went wrong). An antecedent of supreme revocation invoked by some jurists is that of a sentence that the Court had issued in 2007 so that ex-commissioner René Derecho could continue to be investigated for torture against a craftsman, Bueno Alves, so that he would incriminate his lawyer. What happened in this case is that he mediated a sentence from the Inter-American Court of Human Rights.

* Rodríguez Larreta, in a triumphant tone, announced that he will demand that the highest court execute the precautionary measure and that for that he could claim the seizure of the funds that he should receive according to the calculation made by the Supreme Court without giving arguments, according to which the percentage of co-participating mass that the City must receive is 2.95 percent. Another PRO presidential candidate, Patricia Bullrich, rose to the controversy with a threatening tweet dedicated to Silvina Batakis, president of Banco Nación --who also knows the subject well from the times when she dealt with the relationship with the provinces. in the Ministry of the Interior. Bullrich told her that she must send the money immediately or else she and her board would have to respond with her money. Thus raised the discussion, it seems that the State has been depriving the City of funds since 2020 and this is not the case, since it received all this time --since Alberto Fernández's decree that reduced the funds that Mauricio Macri had tripled and then a law in the same sense--, 2.32 percent. On the other hand, what the Government is proposing now is that what the Court indicates is impracticable because it is not included in the 2023 budget law voted in Congress.

* Nothing suggests that the Court will benefit the National State with its resources, and it will be necessary to see if an embargo or some other kind of measure for the execution of the precautionary measure is viable. The latter would process in a new incident. "The field is tilted for now (to the right)", there are those who admit on the fourth floor of the Courts. It does not sound unreasonable for the Fernández government to take the dispute to an extreme at the gates of an election year. When making proposals, it would not be possible to speak of a plain and simple contempt if he decided not to pay or postpone the transfers that the Supreme Court ordered to be daily and automatic. In any case, it would not be unusual for there to be complaints of non-compliance since "war" has been declared.

History of breaches

The head of the Buenos Aires government wanted to highlight that "since 1983 there is no history of a president not complying with a Supreme Court ruling." However, the list of sentences not complied with is extensive, especially by provincial states or in exhortations addressed to Congress, although there is no file exactly comparable to the one that is now at the center of the scene. The one that could have come closest was related to the transfer of the SUBTE in 2012, the Court sought not to intervene and there was a political agreement.

Some court cases involving breaches dragged on for years, and few had any concrete consequences. The most remembered is the one that in 2009 ordered (with a precedent in 2001) to reinstate the ex-prosecutor before the high court of Santa Cruz, Eduardo Sosa, who had been removed as a result of a reform in 1995. The ruling was never complied with, it was feigned with a court intervention. Former Governor Daniel Peralta was sentenced for disobedience in 2018. Among the supreme exhortations to Congress that were not fulfilled, there is an impressive one: the appointment of Defender of the Nation, a position that has been vacant for 13 years; the enactment of a law that allows convicted persons to vote; when the Supreme Court signed the Badaro I ruling to update the pensions, Congress did not follow its guidelines and the Badaro II ruling ended up coming out. In other disputes about co-participation, where the Supreme Court agreed with the provinces, there was no direct compliance, in the case of the government of Mauricio Macri, but over time agreements were established with each local government. The ruling known as FAL (which ratified the cases of non-punishable abortion already established by the Penal Code), which urged the provinces to sanction protocols, not all complied, some took their time. A more recent ruling not yet complied with is the one related to the Atuel River that ordered the province of Mendoza to guarantee a permanent minimum initial flow of 3.2 m3/s on the border with La Pampa.  Where the Supreme Court agreed with the provinces, there was no direct compliance, in the case of the government of Mauricio Macri, but over time it established agreements with each local government. The ruling known as FAL (which ratified the cases of non-punishable abortion already established by the Penal Code), which urged the provinces to sanction protocols, not all complied, some took their time. A more recent ruling not yet complied with is the one related to the Atuel River that ordered the province of Mendoza to guarantee a permanent minimum initial flow of 3.2 m3/s on the border with La Pampa.  Where the Supreme Court agreed with the provinces, there was no direct compliance, in the case of the government of Mauricio Macri, but over time it established agreements with each local government. The ruling known as FAL (which ratified the cases of non-punishable abortion already established by the Penal Code), which urged the provinces to sanction protocols, not all complied, some took their time. A more recent ruling not yet complied with is the one related to the Atuel River that ordered the province of Mendoza to guarantee a permanent minimum initial flow of 3.2 m3/s on the border with La Pampa.  The ruling known as FAL (which ratified the cases of non-punishable abortion already established by the Criminal Code), which urged the provinces to sanction protocols, not all complied, some took their time. A more recent ruling not yet complied with is the one related to the Atuel River that ordered the province of Mendoza to guarantee a permanent minimum initial flow of 3.2 m3/s on the border with La Pampa.  The ruling known as FAL (which ratified the cases of non-punishable abortion already established by the Criminal Code), which urged the provinces to sanction protocols, not all complied, some took their time. A more recent ruling not yet complied with is the one related to the Atuel River that ordered the province of Mendoza to guarantee a permanent minimum initial flow of 3.2 m3/s on the border with La Pampa. 

Among the supreme exhortations to Congress that were not fulfilled, there is an impressive one: the appointment of Defender of the Nation, a position that has been vacant for 13 years; the enactment of a law that allows convicted persons to vote; when the Supreme Court signed the Badaro I ruling to update the pensions, Congress did not follow its guidelines and the Badaro II ruling ended up coming out.