Sergio Leavy
National Senator
Assumed office
10 December 2019
ConstituencySalta
National Deputy
In office
10 December 2017 – 10 December 2019
ConstituencySalta
Mayor of Tartagal
In office
10 December 2007 – 11 April 2018
Preceded byDarío Valenzuela
Succeeded byEduardo Leavy (acting)
Provincial Deputy of Salta
In office
10 December 2003 – 10 December 2007
ConstituencyGeneral San Martín Department
Personal details
Born (1963-11-22) 22 November 1963
San José de Metán, Argentina
Political partyJusticialist Party (until 2003)
Victory Party (2003–present)
Other political
affiliations		Front for Victory (2003–2017)
Citizen's Unity (2017–2019)
Frente de Todos (since 2019)
Alma materUniversidad del Salvador

Sergio Napoleón "Oso" Leavy (born 22 November 1963) is an Argentine businessman and politician, currently serving as a National Senator for Salta Province since 2019. A member of the Victory Party and president of the party's Salta chapter, Leavy previously served as a National Deputy from 2017 to 2019, as intendente (mayor) of Tartagal, Salta from 2007 to 2017, and as a member of the provincial Chamber of Deputies from 2003 to 2007.

Early life and career

Leavy was born on 22 November 1963 in San José de Metán, Salta Province. His mother, Nelly Martínez, was a cooking teacher, while his father, Eduardo Luis Leavy, was a dentist. His grandfather, Napoleón Leavy, was a national senator during the government of Arturo Frondizi, while his uncle, Luciano Leavy, presided the Salta Chamber of Deputies during the governorship of Bernardino Biella. Leavy has four siblings, one of whom, Eduardo "Chanchín" Leavy, is also active in local Salta politics. Leavy enrolled at the Colegio Militar de la Nación in 1982, but dropped out in 1985.[1] He would later study programming at the Universidad del Salvador, in Buenos Aires, graduating in 1987.[2]

In 1988, he moved to Tartagal, Salta, and set up a timber business. He would eventually become president of the Centro Empresario Maderero, the timber business employers' organisation, in 1992. Leavy is married to Andrea Barbieri, with whom he has two daughters.[1]

Political career

Leavy began his political involvement in the Justicialist Party. In 2003, he ran for a seat in the Chamber of Deputies of Salta for General San Martín Department, in which Tartagal is located.[2] That year, he became a member of the newly founded Victory Party, and in 2006, he was elected as president of the party's Salta chapter.[1] Four years later, in 2007, he ran for the intendencia of Tartagal with support from governor candidate Juan Manuel Urtubey; Leavy won against Salta Renewal Party candidate and incumbent mayor, Darío Valenzuela.[3]

Leavy was re-elected for a second term in 2011, once again facing off Valenzuela.[4][5] In the 2013 legislative elections, Leavy ran for a seat in the National Chamber of Deputies for the Victory Party, but having received only 7.66% of the vote, he was not elected.[6]

Leavy sought a third term as mayor of Tartagal in 2015, winning in the Victory Party primaries with 42.44% of the votes. He won against the Salta Renewal Party candidate, Gabriela Martinich.[7][8] In that same election cycle, Leavy ran for a seat in the Parlasur, but lost against former governor Hernán Hipólito Cornejo.[9]

National Deputy

In the 2017 legislative election, Leavy was the first candidate in the Unidad Ciudadana list to the Chamber of Deputies. In Salta, Unidad Ciudadana (an alliance formed by political groups close to former president Cristina Fernández de Kirchner) ran a separate list from the Justicialist Party. With 22% of the vote and placing third, Leavy earned enough votes to be elected.[10]

Before taking office as deputy, Leavy sought to keep his post as mayor of Tartagal, taking an unpaid leave of office for the remainder of his term as deputy.[11] Although the Tartagal city council approved the move, the opposition Radical Civic Union protested and, in April 2018, Leavy resigned from the position and was replaced by his brother, the president of the city council, Eduardo Leavy.[12]

As deputy, Leavy voted against the 2018 Voluntary Interruption of Pregnancy bill, which would have made abortion legal in Argentina. The bill passed the Chamber of Deputies, but was struck down by the Senate.[13]

Gubernatorial campaign and National Senator

Two years after being elected as deputy, in 2019, Leavy ran two simultaneous campaigns for two separate posts as part of the Frente de Todos: the governorship of Salta Province, and one of Salta's three seats in the National Senate. For the governorship, Leavy won against former vice governor Miguel Isa in the Frente de Todos primaries,[14] but eventually lost to Gustavo Sáenz of the Salta Identity Party.[15]

In the campaign for the Senate, Leavy was the first candidate in the Frente de Todos list, followed by Nora Giménez.[16] The Frente de Todos list received 46.3% of the vote, and was the most voted in the province: this granted both Leavy and Giménez the two seats for the majority as per the limited voting system employed in the Argentine Senate.[17] He took office on 27 November 2019.[18] His seat in the Chamber of Deputies was occupied by Juan Emilio Ameri, who would resign less than a year later amid a widely publicized sex scandal.

As senator, Leavy forms part of the parliamentary commissions on Administrative and Municipal Affairs, Constitutional Affairs, General Legislation, and Mining, Energy and Fuels.[2] In 2020, he reversed his former position on the issue of abortion and voted in favour of a new Voluntary Interruption of Pregnancy bill, this time legalizing abortion in Argentina.[19]

References

  1. 1 2 3 "Sergio Napoleón Leavy". Honorable Senado de la Nación (in Spanish). Archived from the original on 22 November 2021. Retrieved 27 November 2021.
  2. 1 2 3 "Sergio Napoleón Leavy". Directorio Legislativo (in Spanish). Archived from the original on 28 November 2021.
  3. ↑ "Quién es Sergio Leavy, "el oso" de Tartagal". Perfil (in Spanish). 3 August 2009. Retrieved 28 November 2021.
  4. ↑ "Votaron Leavy y Valenzuela". El Tribuno (in Spanish). 11 April 2011. Retrieved 28 November 2021.
  5. ↑ "Proclamación de electos" (PDF). Tribunal Electoral de Salta (in Spanish). 10 April 2011. Retrieved 28 November 2021.
  6. ↑ "Elecciones 2013: resultados por provincia, por municipio y por barrio". La Nación (in Spanish). 28 October 2013. Retrieved 28 November 2021.
  7. ↑ "Se disputa el liderazgo en todas las categorías". El Tribuno (in Spanish). 12 April 2015. Retrieved 28 November 2021.
  8. ↑ "Misil de Martinich a Leavy". Cable a Tierra (in Spanish). 14 July 2015. Retrieved 28 November 2021.
  9. ↑ "Sergio Leavy reconoció la derrota y dijo que Cornejo será el candidato al Parlasur". La Gaceta de Salta (in Spanish). 9 August 2015. Retrieved 28 November 2021.
  10. ↑ Ruiz Nicollini, Juan Pablo (22 October 2017). "Salta se pintó de amarillo". Observatorio Electoral Argentino (in Spanish). Retrieved 28 November 2021.
  11. ↑ "Leavy tomó licencia por más de un año para asumir en el Congreso". La Gaceta de Salta (in Spanish). 4 December 2017. Retrieved 28 November 2021.
  12. ↑ "Leavy, intendente de prepo, ratificado presidente del CD de Tartagal". Informate Salta (in Spanish). 1 April 2019. Retrieved 28 November 2021.
  13. ↑ "Despenalización del aborto: cómo votó cada diputado". Letra P (in Spanish). 14 June 2018. Retrieved 28 November 2021.
  14. ↑ "PASO Salta: Sergio Leavy, la oportunidad de cosechar los frutos de la lealtad". Página/12 (in Spanish). 6 October 2019. Retrieved 28 November 2021.
  15. ↑ "Elecciones en Salta: Gustavo Sáenz es el nuevo gobernador". Página/12 (in Spanish). 11 November 2019. Retrieved 28 November 2021.
  16. ↑ "La única lista del Frente de Todos es del "Oso" Leavy". Nuevo Diario de Salta (in Spanish). 5 July 2019. Retrieved 28 November 2021.
  17. ↑ "Quiénes serán los nuevos senadores nacionales". La Gaceta de Salta (in Spanish). 27 October 2019. Retrieved 28 November 2021.
  18. ↑ "Juran los nuevos senadores". Página/12 (in Spanish). 27 November 2019. Retrieved 28 November 2021.
  19. ↑ Pardo, Daniel (30 December 2020). "Aborto en Argentina: 3 claves que explican por qué esta vez sí se aprobó la ley de la interrupción del embarazo". BBC Mundo (in Spanish). Retrieved 28 November 2021.
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