Francis was seen as being too close to the Kirchnerists in ideology and too conflicted with the Kirchnerists in actions when he was Archbishop. Visiting Argentina would have forced him to take a side and trigger a political crisis he probably wanted to avoid.
As far as I know there's no similar conflict with the new Pope, and he wasn't even in America for the most important part of his church career.
Francis was the most important supporter of liberation theology in Argentina, which was very ideologically aligned with the Kirchners. He was also strongly opposed to almost every politician who opposed the government.
Bergoglio had several conflicts with the Kirchner government when he was an Archbishop. Cristina didn't tell the position the government would take when he got elected Pope, but the government-aligned (but not government-controlled) mass media associations preemptively filled Buenos Aires with anti-Bergoglio propaganda.
A week later Cristina met the Pope and announced that they were politically aligned, and the same mass media associations filled Buenos Aires with pro-Bergoglio propaganda.
> Francis was the most important supporter of liberation theology in Argentina
Really? I am Italian, so I known Bergoglio only by name before he became Pope, but I always heard that he was not really a supporter of liberation theology.
Anyway, during his papacy he showed that he was influenced in many aspectes by liberation theology and peronism approach.
As far as I know there's no similar conflict with the new Pope, and he wasn't even in America for the most important part of his church career.