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Cristina Fern\u00e1ndez de Kirchner, Argentina\u2019s former president and one of the country\u2019s most polarizing political figures, was sentenced to prison on Tuesday and barred for life from public office after the Supreme Court upheld her corruption conviction.<\/p>\n
The ruling is likely to deepen political tensions in the country and comes after Mrs. Kirchner, who was the target of an assassination attempt<\/a> three years ago, announced plans for a political comeback<\/a>.<\/p>\n Supporters blocked key highways around the capital, Buenos Aires, ahead of the court decision against the left-leaning Mrs. Kirchner, who has clashed repeatedly with Argentina\u2019s right-wing president, Javier Milei, while major labor unions had threatened national strikes.<\/p>\n The Supreme Court rejected an appeal by Mrs. Kirchner in a 27-page ruling, cementing a six-year sentence handed down by a lower court that had found she defrauded the state during her two terms as president, from 2007 to 2015. <\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n Still, Mrs. Kirchner, 72, is unlikely to serve significant prison time as Argentine law often allows house arrest for those over age 70. The lower court, which will determine if Mrs. Kirchner gets home detention, said she had five business days to present herself before the tribunal to be officially detained. Separately, it <\/span>asked the security minister to provide an appropriate place for her detention.<\/p>\n The former president could be held behind bars for a few days until a judge approves her home detention, said Andr\u00e9s Gil Dom\u00ednguez, a constitutional law professor at the University of Buenos Aires.<\/p>\n Mrs. Kirchner told supporters outside her party\u2019s headquarters shortly after the court ruling, \u201cThis Argentina we\u2019re living in today never ceases to surprise us.\u201d She called the three members of the Supreme Court \u201cpuppets\u201d and characterized them as \u201ca \u201ctriumvirate of disgraceful figures\u201d who answered to powerful economic interests, and said they were now \u201cimposing a clamp on the popular vote.\u201d<\/p>\n As for Mr. Milei, he wrote, \u201cJustice\u201d on X and reposted several messages that celebrated the Supreme Court\u2019s ruling.<\/p>\n A fixture in Argentine politics for more than three decades, Mrs. Kirchner remains a divisive figure. While much of the country views her presidency as synonymous with economic mismanagement and corruption, she continues to command a loyal base that credits her with expansive social programs.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n Mrs. Kirchner, who was also vice president from 2019 to 2023, has faced numerous charges of corruption<\/a>. She was convicted in 2022<\/a> of steering public roadworks contracts in a southern province to a family friend and business associate.<\/p>\n Mrs. Kirchner has denounced the charges as politically motivated, accusing opponents of weaponizing the judiciary to curb her influence.<\/p>\n The court determined that the scheme had began under her husband and predecessor, N\u00e9stor Kirchner, and continued during her two presidential terms. He had been governor of southern Santa Cruz Province and served as president from 2003 to 2007. Mr. Kirchner died in 2010.<\/p>\n Since 2024, she has led the Justicialist Party, the main opposition force to Mr. Milei and the largest political platform for Peronism, the populist, nationalist movement that has shaped much of Argentina\u2019s modern political history.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n Mr. Milei has frequently blamed Mrs. Kirchner, as well as her husband, for years of economic mismanagement and systemic corruption that sent the country into a downward economic spiral. Mr. Milei won office in 2023 by vowing to slash public spending and overhaul Argentina\u2019s state-heavy economy<\/a>.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n Mrs. Kirchner recently announced that she was running for a seat in the Buenos Aires provincial legislature in elections this year. She would have been a heavy favorite, and a victory would have granted her immunity from serving the sentence.<\/p>\n \u201cCoincidence is not a political category,\u201d Mrs. Kirchner told supporters on Monday as she prepared for the decision from Argentina\u2019s highest court. \u201cIt only took us announcing a candidacy a week ago for the demons to be unleashed.\u201d<\/p>\n She characterized efforts to imprison her as a way to quiet her criticism of Mr. Milei\u2019s right-wing economic policies, which have included broad austerity measures.<\/p>\n \u201cGo ahead, throw me in prison,\u201d she said Monday. \u201cDo you really believe this will fix anything? I might be behind bars, but people will be worse off by the day.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n During Mrs. Kirchner\u2019s trial in 2022, supporters gathered outside her Buenos Aires apartment every day to show solidarity.<\/p>\n In September of that year, a man at the entrance to her building pointed a loaded pistol at her head at close range. The weapon jammed, and she was uninjured. The accused gunman and two others are detained and facing trial.<\/p>\n The former president faces several other legal issues, including accusations of money laundering, orchestrating a corruption scheme involving public works and conspiring with Iran to cover up its suspected role in the 1994 bombing of a Jewish community center in Buenos Aires that killed 85 people.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n