In less than 48 hours, Juan Grabois went from a public fight with Mayra Mendoza in Quilmes to activating a protest in Lanús, another municipality governed by La Cámpora, and ended up as the target of a direct criticism from Victoria Tolosa Paz, who chose to stand on the side of “institutional order” and accused the leader of resorting to “extortionist” mechanisms. This sequence is not an isolated incident: it exposes a Peronist internal struggle in Buenos Aires that has ceased to be underground and is now also played out in street control, municipal governability, and the dispute over who represents “the popular sectors.”
Quilmes: an ordinance, repression, and the break with Mayra Mendoza
The trigger was an ordinance from the Quilmes Deliberative Council that approved regulated parking in central areas and other traffic control systems. This measure led to incidents outside the Municipality, with police repression, injuries, and arrests among demonstrators linked to the Excluded Workers Movement (MTE), whose main representative is Grabois.
The political issue was not the ordinance itself, but what it affected: “control of the street.” The coexistence between Grabois' factions and those of Mendoza was already tense but contained; the conflict erupted when the idea of a private company came into play and the reconfiguration of a territory where the “trapitos” had been operating informally.
Grabois interpreted it as a “cooked privatization” and denounced repression against militants and workers. On the other hand, from the municipality, they defended that the regulation sought to formalize those who carried out that task with contributions and health coverage, and Mendoza—in an audio cited by the same outlet—reproached Grabois for fostering violence when the Executive offered “order and formal work.”
In terms of power, Quilmes left a message: the conflict is no longer just “Kicillof vs. La Cámpora” in the abstract, but a dispute about how public space is managed and who sets the rules in sensitive districts of the suburban area.
Lanús: the protest “moves” to another camporista municipality
The day after the clash in Quilmes, activists aligned with Grabois activated a new protest in Lanús, a municipality governed by the camporista Julián Álvarez. Protesters from the UTEP demanded for hours in front of the municipality a salary increase for cooperative workers responsible for street cleaning and denounced that they earn $140,000 per month.
This episode added elements that carry weight in politics: a blockade, tension with the police, mutual accusations, and a symbolic act—the burning of the municipality's Christmas tree—until the demand was lifted after the mayor committed to meeting with them the following Friday.
The municipality interpreted the mobilization as a “picket with political intent” and not as a genuine claim. The internal reading left by Lanús is powerful: Grabois (or his organizational universe) can carry conflict to camporista districts in chain, and this serves as a pressure tool within Buenos Aires Peronism.
Tolosa Paz enters the scene: “institutionality” vs. “likes” and pickets
In this climate, Victoria Tolosa Paz decided to get involved in the fight and chose a framing that discomforts Grabois: she backed the political legitimacy of Mayra Mendoza and criticized what she called the “extortionist mechanism of the pickets.”
The sharpest blow was the subtext: Tolosa accused him of acting for the digital audience (“seeking likes”) and of playing “small.” She went further: she proposed that Buenos Aires Peronism would do well to settle differences in internas, with the leadership of the provincial PJ “in dispute,” as the term of Máximo Kirchner approaches.
Is Grabois seeking more political weight?
Grabois is trying to increase his weight, not necessarily by winning a classic internal struggle, but by accumulating veto power and negotiation capacity. His public messages say he does not care about the internal conflicts between La Cámpora and Kicillofism, but his movements impact right there, where it hurts: in their own municipalities, on the streets, and in daily governability.
The risk for Buenos Aires Peronism is twofold. If La Cámpora responds by closing ranks with “order” and repression, it hands Grabois a narrative of “the upper class against the workers.” If it concedes, it admits that there is an actor outside the traditional apparatus capable of conditioning management. And, in the middle, figures like Tolosa Paz smell an opportunity to showcase themselves.
The internal struggle is not ideological: it’s about command. Who leads, who manages the conflict, and who decides the 2027 strategy. Grabois is pushing that discussion out in the open. And when a leader manages to get the rest of the space to organize around him—whether to confront him, contain him, or differentiate themselves—it is because he has already won something: centrality.
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