Witness in Adorni Flight Case Does Not Back His Version

The judicial investigation into the private flight in which Manuel Adorni returned from Punta del Este heard testimony on Thursday that directly undermines the public defense of the Chief of Staff. Agustín Issin Hansen, a pilot and aviation broker linked to the billing of the return leg, testified for nearly four hours before Judge Ariel Lijo at Comodoro Py. He provided documentation and images extracted from his mobile phone and stated that the reservation and payment for the flight were not made by Adorni, but by Marcelo Grandio, a journalist friend of the official and contractually linked to the Public TV. That delay in billing, one of the points that had raised the most suspicion, was justified by the witness with a concrete argument: he said he had been on vacation and only issued the invoice upon resuming his activities. In practice, his explanation can be debated, but what matters politically is another point: the key witness did not back the version of the Chief of Staff, but that of Grandio's inner circle. The situation becomes even more awkward for Adorni because the evidence gathered by the Justice system does not, for now, show him as the direct payer for either leg of the trip. Additionally, the investigation has advanced on the relationship between Adorni and Grandio, on the payments for the trips, and on the possible existence of other flights or benefits that could be classified as gifts. That defense, which was already weak, was further weakened after Thursday's testimony. The judicial reaction shows that the case has ceased to be a minor episode or a simple media controversy. The testimony exposed a direct contradiction with what the Coordinator Minister himself has been repeating for days: that he paid for the trip with family money. As reconstructed from the case, Issin Hansen explained that he acted as a broker and had acquired a package of ten flights from Alpha Centauri for $42,250, one of which was the service used for Adorni's return. For a government that sought to shield the Chief of Staff with the idea that it was political attacks and journalistic operations, the problem is beginning to be more serious: the doubts no longer arise only in the media, but within the file itself. He also confirmed that he issued an invoice for $3,000 in the name of Marcelo Grandio, dated March 9, that is, several weeks after the trip. And on that front, every document, every invoice, and every statement weighs much more than any defensive press conference. In parallel, Adorni insisted at his Wednesday press conference that he is "tired of saying" that he paid for the trip, although he avoided showing receipts and refused to give details, stating that it was a private transaction. On Wednesday, at the request of Prosecutor Gerardo Pollicita, Judge Lijo ordered an operation on the offices of Alpha Centauri S.A. at San Fernando airport, where commercial documentation, budgets, contracts, customer records, and communications related to the flight were seized. The decision to deepen measures against the company that operated the aircraft reveals that at Comodoro Py, the case is no longer read as a private matter, but as a file with possible criminal implications. The testimony of Issin Hansen does not close the case, but it does mark a turning point. From now on, Adorni's version clashes not only with suspicious invoices and zigzagging explanations from third parties, but also with the word of a witness who presented himself to Justice with documentation in hand and maintained a narrative incompatible with that of the official. The outbound flight to Uruguay was already associated with Imhouse, Grandio's production company, while on the return leg, first the package invoice for ten flights appeared, and then the individual invoice issued by Issin Hansen to the journalist himself. Buenos Aires, March 26, 2026 - Total News Agency - TNA -.