María Eugenia Vidal

María Eugenia Vidal (born September 8, 1973) is an Argentine politician. Affiliated with the Republican Proposal party, she was appointed Minister of Social Development of the City of Buenos Aires, and in 2011 was elected Deputy Mayor. She is current Governor of the province of Buenos Aires, the largest Argentine province and home to 40% of Argentina's population, being the first woman and the first non-Peronist since 1987 to be voted into this office.

Life and times

Vidal was born in Buenos Aires. She was raised in the Flores ward and enrolled in the Pontifical Catholic University of Argentina, earning a degree in Political Science. She met Ramiro Tagliaferro, a classmate at the university, and they married in 1998; the couple has a son and two daughters.

She began her career in Grupo Sophia, a think tank founded by Horacio Rodríguez Larreta. She was named director of the group's social policy desk in 2000, as well as of Fundación Creer y Crecer, a think tank organized by Commitment to Change, a conservative political party led by mayoral candidate Mauricio Macri. Vidal was elected to the Buenos Aires City Legislature in 2003, and was appointed Chair of the Committee on Women and Youth. She served in the Human Resources Department at PAMI (the national health insurance service for the elderly and disabled), and as adviser to ANSES (the social security administration), as well as the nation's Ministries of Social Development and Foreign Relations.