The former Peronist senator is under house arrest in a residence in Asunción, pending decisions that will define his judicial future in both Paraguay and Argentina.
The Kueider case began on the night of December 4, 2024, when agents from the National Revenue Directorate found over 211,000 dollars, 640,000 guaraníes, and nearly 4 million pesos distributed among bags and compartments in a Chevrolet Trailblazer he was traveling in from Foz do Iguazú to Ciudad del Este. None of the amounts had been declared to Paraguayan customs.
However, the Public Ministry of that country determined that the judge's request can only be resolved once the smuggling process is finalized.
For Arroyo Salgado, the connection between Kueider and Enersa, the electricity distributor in Entre Ríos, is decisive. However, the couple had to move in early February to another property also in the Paraguayan capital, where they will await the date of April 20, 2026, when the trial that will determine their criminal liability for the crime of attempted smuggling will begin.
Last December, the Senate expelled Kueider for moral incapacity with the vote of more than two-thirds of its members; his office was sealed pending the progress of the judicial investigation.
On the Argentine side of the border, Kueider has two open judicial fronts for illicit enrichment: one in San Isidro, where Federal Magistrate Sandra Arroyo Salgado is involved, and another in the provincial justice of Entre Ríos, led by the judge of Concordia, Ives Bastián. After a tug-of-war over the jurisdiction of the file, Arroyo Salgado elevated the dispute to the Supreme Court of Justice so that, after the opinion of Prosecutor Eduardo Casal, the highest court can define where the investigation must continue.
As reported by the Argentine News Agency, Arroyo Salgado's suspicions were so serious that she requested the extradition of Kueider from Paraguayan justice, which was initially rejected. The Public Ministry charged both with attempted smuggling, which provides for a penalty of up to two and a half years in prison.
The former senator's defense. "Time and truth will always triumph," Kueider expressed on his social media networks on the same night of October 26, when La Libertad Avanza (LLA) was achieving a crushing victory nationwide. According to the Argentine News Agency, from his house arrest in Paraguay, Kueider stated that he was "proud to have promoted in the Senate the single ballot system that the country has successfully premiered," which he considered "a huge leap towards institutional quality and the exercise of democracy."
Kuieder's post. According to the investigation, the former senator had represented the Executive Branch in assemblies of the state-owned company, and the magistrate maintains that the dollars seized in Paraguay could be linked to a circuit of bribes and kickbacks from the security firm.
The vehicle they were traveling in was not owned by either of them, but by Daniel González, a permanent employee of the Library of Congress. During his statement before Paraguayan authorities, then-legislator Kueider stated that neither he nor Guinsel Costa were the owners of the dollars, and that the money was linked to business intermediation for investors in Paraguay.
