Former Milei consultant arrested in Bolivia for plotting girlfriend's murder reveals far-right network
Fernando Cerimedo, arrested in Bolivia for contracting hitmen against his partner, emerges as a key organiser of the Latin American far right. His detention opens an investigation that implicates governments of several countries.
The Cerimedo case: from attempted femicide to continental far-right network
The arrest in Bolivia of Argentine political consultant Fernando Cerimedo for planning the murder of his girlfriend, Nadia Beller, with the help of two hitmen has triggered an investigation that far exceeds the crime itself. According to laopiniondemurcia.es, the detention of the founder of La Derecha Diario has opened a Pandora's box that exposes his role as an organiser of the far right in Latin America, with active presence in Peru, Chile, Honduras, Bolivia and Brazil.
The Economist described him in December last year as "the MAGA man in Latin America" and warned that "the list of places in Latin America that have not been touched by Cerimedo's hand is shrinking". This former sausage seller who presented himself as a Harvard alumnus began his political career alongside Jair Bolsonaro in 2018 and left his mark on the campaigns of José Antonio Kast and Keiko Fujimori, neither of whom reached the presidency.
For Ignacio Fidanza, director of the La Política Online portal in Buenos Aires, "behind Cerimedo there is an instrument of geopolitical intervention for the entire region, which emerges from Trumpism".
Mobile messages and a bot farm
During the search of a residence that Cerimedo occupied in La Paz, the Bolivian authorities confiscated thousands of dollars and an alleged bot farm capable of generating thousands of messages through artificially created accounts. As the investigation advances, the consultant becomes more implicated in the planning of the attack against Beller.
His telephone has provided prosecutors with evidence they consider conclusive. Among the messages found is one that reads: "Brother, at this moment they shot her. She is injured". Other messages were deleted. Police identified the two alleged perpetrators of the attack; one of them would be of Colombian nationality, according to the Santa Cruz press.
Beller, a lawyer and pregnant with the consultant's child, stated: "He attempted to commit a femicide to silence me, to prevent me from reporting previous instances of violence and to prevent me from making public the knowledge I had acquired during our time living together". Her decision to "tell what I know" and provide evidence makes more than one government in the region uncomfortable.
Links with governments: Bolivia, Argentina and Peru
Bolivian president Rodrigo Paz fears that the investigation will advance towards his circle. His Minister of Public Works, Mauricio Zamora, denied that Cerimedo had taken up residence in the Burnt Palace and assured that "he only advised on communications matters".
From Argentina, Javier Milei's spokesperson, Andrián Ravier, attempted to distance the president from the scandal: "They have had no relationship since 2023". However, Ravier has been unable to explain why in 2024 Cerimedo received Luis Galarreta, current vice president of Peru, at the Argentine Executive headquarters. Former ruling-party deputy Marcela Pagano asserted that the consultant had his own office there. Milei, for his part, continues to post articles from La Derecha Diario on X.
Chile seeks explanations over electoral interference
In Chile, socialist deputy Daniel Manoucheri demanded transparency: "President Kast and the Republican Party must clarify their links with Fernando Cerimedo. The country deserves to know who has financed these groups". Another socialist legislator, Juan Santana, requested that the Electoral Service (Servel) determine whether Cerimedo played any role in the most recent elections.
The request was based on a complaint filed in July 2025 by then right-wing presidential candidate Evelyn Matthei, who warned of social media attacks that led her to report Kast's party. Cerimedo, who was in Brazil in 2019 when Chile experienced its social upheaval, landed in Santiago shortly thereafter and intervened through his consultancy Numen in the constitutional process with false polls and disinformation campaigns, according to ongoing investigations.
Connection with Brazil coup attempt
Cerimedo is also being investigated for his alleged involvement in the events of 8 January 2023 in Brazil, when a crowd stormed the institutions of the state in an attempted coup against president Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva. His relationship with the Brazilian far right reaches the highest level.
On 23 July, when according to Bolivian authorities he was already planning the femicide, Cerimedo participated in a live programme alongside former deputy Eduardo Bolsonaro, a fugitive from justice. The broadcast took place two days after Eduardo's brother, senator and presidential candidate Flávio Bolsonaro, cited false information about ballot boxes before ambassadors in Brasilia. During the transmission, which lasted close to an hour, both reactivated suspicions about the Brazilian electoral system similar to those Jair Bolsonaro had spread in 2022, and joined Donald Trump's accusations of a possible fraud in the US mid-term elections.
Mexico and the regional disinformation network
Mexican president Claudia Sheinbaum pointed directly at the consultant: "He is an adviser to several presidents of Latin America. The central issue is that here we have reported that he promotes the dissemination of false news. La Derecha Diario is part of this network". Sheinbaum added that the same group "operates in Mexico" and "is linked with some US agency".
The sale of La Derecha Diario from prison
Journalist Javier Negre stated to the Buenos Aires newspaper Clarín that Cerimedo no longer maintains links with La Derecha Diario and has sold him the 50 per cent of shares he held. "He was not using the media for anything. He once requested an article, signed an article, but he was very focused on his advisory work in Bolivia", Negre asserted, noting that "the last time I saw him in person, if I recall correctly, was at the Mar-a-Lago gala".
The magazine Noticias highlighted a detail that did not go unnoticed: the sales operation was formalised when the Argentine consultant was already detained in Bolivia. The fact that Cerimedo's regional activities have been interrupted due to an attempted femicide has led several Argentine analysts to review earlier episodes of his trajectory that until now had remained in the shadows.
Source: Google News ES — Crime (es)