President Trump said the United States “won’t waste” time on Argentina if the current president loses an upcoming election. 

Mr. Trump welcomed at the White House the Argentinian president, Javier Milei, who secured a $20 billion currency swap to help his country out of debt. 

The president commented on the upcoming midterm elections for Argentina’s legislative body, telling Mr. Milei that his poll numbers are “pretty good.”

“But I think they’ll be better after this,” Mr. Trump said, referring to the $20 billion deal.  

“Our approvals are somewhat subject to who wins the election. If the president doesn’t win – I know the person that he’d be running against. … A person who is extremely far left, and a philosophy that got Argentina into this problem in the first place,” Mr Trump said.  

“So we would not be generous with Argentina if that happened. If he loses, we are not going to be generous with Argentina. We’re going to work very much with the president. We think he’s going to win,” he said.  

“He should win, and if he does win, we’re going to be very helpful. And if he doesn’t win, we’re not going to waste our time, because you have somebody whose philosophy has no chance of making Argentina great again,” the president added. 

The deal, largely seen as a bailout for Argentina’s financial problems, was criticized by Senator Elizabeth Warren, a Democratic of Massachusetts who introduced legislation last week to stop the bailout. 

“It is inexplicable that President Trump is propping up a foreign government, while he shuts down our own. Trump promised ‘America First,’ but he’s putting himself and his billionaire buddies first and sticking Americans with the bill,” she said.

Senator Jeanne Shaheen, a Democrat, also slammed the deal, saying: “President Trump seems to think it’s more important to offer $20 billion to bail out Argentina than it is to make a bipartisan deal to prevent health insurance premiums from spiking for over 20 million Americans in a matter of days.”

“That’s not America First — it’s President Trump putting his political allies first even as Americans struggle to make ends meet,” the senator added. 

A senior fellow at the Peterson Institute for International Economics, Monica de Bolle, also criticized Mr. Trump’s aid package for Argentina. “It’s a country in crisis, it’s running out of dollars, and the U.S. is giving the country dollars. That’s a bailout by definition,” Ms. De Bolle told the New York Times.