Exclusive investigation.
Starting in 2010, the United States began actively financing Argentina with tens of millions of dollars annually, distributed among government agencies, NGOs (which in practice now operate very little in the country), and specialized units within the prosecutor’s office.

Put simply, every adult U.S. taxpayer pays several hundred dollars a year for these programs. Not abstract “federal money,” but their own — earned and withheld through taxes.

The question is: what exactly are you paying for?

The money goes to the “fight against human trafficking” — but only on paper

One of the main categories of government funding is security, specifically combating human trafficking and illicit drug trafficking. These crimes affect hundreds of thousands, and by some estimates millions of people across Latin America every year, leading to massive human tragedies, destroyed families, loss of freedom and life, and long-term social and demographic consequences for entire countries and regions.

In Argentina, the primary institution “spending” these allocated funds is the prosecutor’s office, including the specialized unit PROTEX (Office of the Prosecutor for Trafficking and Exploitation of Persons).

PROTEX reports each year on hundreds of criminal cases and investigations opened. These figures appear in international reports, are used as proof of “effectiveness,” and become the basis for new rounds of funding.

However, according to human rights advocates and analysis of the court decisions themselves, more than half of these cases never result in a conviction.

Years in prison without charges or guilt

Between 2016 and 2025, hundreds of human trafficking cases were investigated in Buenos Aires Province, including sexual and labor exploitation. Defendants were predominantly men and women aged 25–55, although cases involving people over 60 were also recorded (those aged 70–80 being rare exceptions).

Nationwide, between 800 and more than 2,000 complaints are filed each year through a special hotline.
Arrests and procedural actions related to trafficking number in the dozens or hundreds annually across Argentina.

But a closer look reveals a different picture: more than half of those imprisoned in Argentina on trafficking charges are held in pretrial detention.
That is, there are no formal charges or proven evidence against them, they cannot be considered convicted, yet they serve real prison time before an actual trial takes place.

This is not a real investigation, but its imitation. In cases of this kind, all key circumstances could and should have been gathered and verified within one month: testimonies, expert evaluations, financial and procedural documents. That timeframe is sufficient for an initial investigation and fact-finding.

Instead, the process is deliberately dragged out for many months and years precisely because no objective evidence exists, and because swift, lawful, and transparent procedural actions are simply not carried out.

The delay itself appears to function as a tool: it allows continued use of budget funds under the guise of “fighting crime,” while simultaneously avoiding a formal acknowledgment of innocence, which would inevitably trigger state liability and compensation payments.

As a result, the penitentiary system is used not as an instrument of justice, but as a means of pressure. Prison turns into a form of torture aimed at psychological and physical coercion to obtain confessions, rather than at establishing the truth.
The average length of pretrial detention in Argentina is three years.

A stable and repeatable scheme

Fernando Arrigo — a controversial Argentine prosecutor repeatedly accused by human rights defenders of orchestrating fabricated criminal cases.

A consistent pattern emerges: a high-profile arrest, seizure of money and property, pretrial detention lasting four to six years without a verdict, followed by release “due to lack of evidence.”
No apologies. No compensation. No return of property. The more such cases there are, the better the reports look and the easier it becomes to secure new funding. Broken lives simply vanish from the statistics, as if they never existed.

Key figures in these processes include PROTEX leaders Marcelo Colombo and Alejandra Mángano, as well as federal prosecutors such as Oscar Fernando Arrigo, Tomás Labayle, Gustavo Révora, and Rodrigo Treviranus. All of them are mentioned in recent complaints alleging investigative abuses and misappropriation of funds in fabricated cases.

Meanwhile, overall crime levels in Argentina remain high and continue to rise in some regions.
Because fighting real human traffickers and drug cartels — often well protected both legally and physically — is far more difficult than arresting just anyone “for the statistics.”

“Three years without a verdict”: the story of a pastor

In 2020, an evangelical pastor leading a small religious community was arrested in Argentina. He was charged with “exploitation of vulnerable persons,” a formulation frequently used in PROTEX cases.

Year after year, the charges were rewritten, key episodes collapsed, witnesses recanted — yet the man remained behind bars for nearly three years. Only then did the court acknowledge that there were no grounds to continue holding him in custody. He was released without a formal acquittal, without apologies, and without compensation — legally “not convicted,” but in reality the punishment had already been served.

Buenos Aires Yoga School: a loud raid, but no proven crimes

In August 2022, the PROTEX prosecutor’s office carried out one of the loudest raids in recent years in Buenos Aires against Buenos Aires Yoga School, a philosophical school with more than 30 years of history, branding it a “cult” and a human trafficking network.

More than 50 searches, around 19 arrests, and a wave of sensational headlines created the image of a large-scale crime. But as the investigation progressed, the narrative fell apart: the women labeled as “victims” denied coercion, expert examinations found no exploitation or psychological control, and the appellate court ruled the evidence insufficient, effectively sending the case back to square one and casting doubt on the very existence of a crime.

Konstantin Rudnev: a living example of the system

In March 2025, Argentine authorities conducted a high-profile operation under the banner of combating international human trafficking and drug trafficking, during which Russian tourists were detained. One of those detained was Konstantin Rudnev, a Russian dissident and opponent of the Putin regime.

The investigation named a Russian woman and her newborn son as alleged “victims,” but she immediately stated publicly that she had never known Rudnev and had no claims against him.

The seized pills were sent for expert testing, which found no narcotic substances. No one filed a complaint or testified against Rudnev. Under such circumstances, the investigation should have been terminated due to a complete lack of evidence. Instead, most of the detainees were later released, while Rudnev remains in a maximum-security prison under pretrial detention — without a verdict, without confirmed victims, and without defined time limits — clearly demonstrating the selective nature of the system’s operation.

An uncomfortable question for Americans

U.S. money is officially allocated to protect human rights.
But if it:

• finances years of imprisonment without trial;
• rewards statistics instead of justice;
• supports structures that even courts themselves identify as violating the law —

then the question becomes personal.

You pay for this.

What U.S. taxpayers have the right to demand

If U.S. funds are directed toward “human rights protection” programs, trust is possible only under three basic conditions:

• End the falsification of investigations.

• Conduct an urgent review of trafficking cases. Where there is no evidence and investigation timelines exceed acceptable limits, people must be released. The presumption of innocence cannot be a formality.

• Audit the financial records.
  PROTEX and the Argentine prosecutor’s office must show exactly where international assistance funds, including U.S. money, are going. An independent audit is required.

• Money only in exchange for reforms.
  

If these conditions are not met, funding for Argentina’s security system — and the federal public prosecutor’s office in particular — must be terminated.

It is a simple question:
if it is our money, we have the right to know how it is being spent.
And that is exactly what this system fears most.