SANTIAGO – Chile has become the latest Latin American country to ditch the left after voters, driven by fears of crime and migration, elected on Sunday their first far-right leader since the end of a vicious military dictatorship in 1990.
Leftist leaders have not won a single presidential election in Latin America this year as voters tired of economic woes and invigorated by strongman rhetoric in the style of U.S. President Donald Trump or El Salvador’s gang-busting leader Nayib Bukele, opt for change.
Chile was the latest domino to fall, with 59-year-old anti-abortion, tough-on-crime candidate Jose Antonio Kast taking 58% of the vote versus 42% for leftist rival Jeannette Jara.
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