This week, the Trump administration authorized a $20 billion financial lifeline for Argentina

as it faces a deepening economic crisis.

But the justification of the deal has raised major questions and criticism about its merits.

John Yang helps to break it down.

Omna, the United States is exchanging dollars for Argentine pesos to prop up that currency,

which has been losing value recently.

President Trump announced the move on Tuesday as he met with Argentine President

Javier Malay at the White House, and he made clear that this is contingent on Malay's party

winning legislative elections later this month. I'm with this man because his philosophy is correct.

And he may win and he may not win, but I think he's going to win.

And if he wins, we're staying with him, and if he doesn't win, we're gone.

In addition, Treasury Secretary Scott Besant has said the administration

is trying to secure an additional $20 billion for Argentina through private banks and sovereign wealth funds.

Monica DeBole is an economist at the Peterson Institute for International Economics.

Monica, first of all, what's going on in Argentina that makes this necessary or they're trying to react to?

So Argentina is facing the kind of problem that it usually faces.

It's an economy that functions with both the peso and the dollar.

So Argentina is a partially dollarized economy.

It uses the dollar as if it were its own currency. And oftentimes what

happens is that they run into a shortage of dollars. So whenever they run out of dollars,

they fall into crisis, which is what's happening now. And the U.S. is stepping in to provide

the dollars that Argentina needs. But as you say, this happens periodically, this isn't going to fix it, is it?

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