An Emergency Government in Chile

Jose Antonio Kast proclaimed, well before taking over on March 11 as president of Chile, that his government would be an “emergency” government.

He made this claim based on the same set of facts about Chile that he used repeatedly during his successful campaign for the presidency: a broken immigration system including a porous border with Peru and Bolivia, the low level of the depleted sovereignty fund reserved for future emergencies, an unacceptable organized crime and public security situation, and sluggish economic growth.

In spite of these conditions that Kast argued he inherited from the prior government, the idea that Chile required “emergency” governance is debatable. Admittedly, economic growth is too low, but inflation may be as low as 4% for 2026, and projected at 3% for 2027. And, after the Boric government finally decided, with urging from the moderate left, that the police and border security forces needed considerable investment and stronger supportive regulatory regimes, notable improvements were already being made to address immigration and personal security weaknesses. More is certainly needed, but Kast did not inherit a country, or an economy, that in his words is “broke”.

Broad national emergency declarations were used during the Pinochet dictatorship (1973-1990) to facilitate the suspension of civil rights, many Chileans, especially those aligned with the leftist parties most directly affected, are still allergic to emergency declarations of the government. Kast, certainly aware but in spite of this, has proceeded to provide his opponents with reasons to doubt his commitment to democratic principles. Prior to taking over the presidency, he visited Presidents Orban in Hungary and Bukele in El Salvador, ostensibly to observe their methods for crime and immigration suppression. He attended President Trump’s “Shield of the America’s” gathering of like-minded leaders in Miami. So, when he was sworn in, the leftist opposition was already primed, by these gratuitous actions, to find anti-democratic tendencies in the plans of his government.

Kast’s inauguration was a gathering of mostly conservative, right-wing authorities. President Javier Milei of Argentina was the most notable Latin American leader to attend, but the conservative leaders of Ecuador, Peru, Panama, Paraguay, and Uruguay were also there. When President Lula of Brazil realized Kast had also invited the main opposition candidate to his reelection later this year, Flavio Bolsonaro, Lula conveniently found a scheduling problem and canceled his participation. The Presidents of Mexico and Colombia did not attend. Maria Corina Machado, one of Venezuela’s opposition leaders and Nobel Peace Prize recipient, was there, creating quite a stir with the large Venezuelan immigrant community in Chile. The US delegation was led by Deputy Secretary of State, Chris Landau, whose father was a well-known ambassador in Latin America, including Chile and Venezuela.

The first few months of the Kast administration have been a bit rocky. He started by withdrawing Chile’s official support for ex-President Michelle Bachelet’s candidacy for the prestigious position of Secretary General of the United Nations. During the last weeks of his administration, Boric put forward Bachelet’s candidacy, with the official support of Mexico and Brazil. Kast felt slighted by Boric slipping this candidacy into the public eye at an earlier UN General Assembly meeting, reportedly without prior consultation with him as the incoming president. But more importantly, much of the extreme right wing that supports Kast has deeply-held negative views of Bachelet and her performance as president of Chile. They hold her responsible for the fact that since her second term as president, Chile has had economic growth of a meager 2.0 %, when for thirty years prior, the economy had grown an average of 5.5 % yearly. They attribute this slowdown in great part to her tax, education, and labor reforms.

Even though Bachelet is no longer supported for the UN position by the Chilean government, her candidacy is still sponsored officially by Mexico and Brazil, and she is being advised on the subject by a group of ex-foreign affairs ministers from past Chilean governments. She continues to plead her case by visiting the member countries of the UN Security Council. So far, however, she has not found her way to the Trump administration, probably well aware that it will be a hard sell. The best she can hope for in the case of the US, is that her candidacy is not vetoed, although voices within the conservative side of the US Congress have objected loudly to her support for the woman’s right to abortion. The recent suggestion that Trump may support the FIFA president, Gianni Infantino, for the position, suggests the process for this position is far from over, and that in some quarters is not being taken too seriously. Without the support of her own country, it’s hard to imagine her candidacy being successful.

If Bachelet were to become the UN Secretary General, she would be the first woman to hold that prestigious position. This is a long shot, but it would certainly place a cloud over Kast and his decision, based in petty national partisan politics, not to support a citizen of his country for an important place on the international stage.

On the other hand, the Kast administration did pick up a proposal made earlier by President Boric, that Valparaiso host the secretariat of the United Nations treaty on Marine Biological Diversity of Areas beyond National Jurisdiction (BBNJ Agreement). Against other strong and logical candidates, like Brussels, Belgium and Xiamen, China, were Chile to be chosen, it would be further recognition of Chile’s leadership in global concern for biodiversity conservation. The BBNJ Agreement is the implementing instrument within the framework agreement referred to as the Law of the Sea. It intends to regulate marine genetic resources and establish marine protected areas in the two-thirds of the ocean beyond national borders.

Chile’s proposal highlights Valparaiso’s long history as a port that blends public and private institutions intimately involved in the ocean and its riches, and several universities engaged in studies related to marine biodiversity, its utilization and protection. The local authorities of course see all sorts of benefits, both economic and cultural, that would flow to the city and the nation from activity around such an international center, but they must also recognize that Valparaiso is a city in decline. In spite of its designation in 2003 by UNESCO as a World Heritage Site, the city center is increasingly more dilapidated, street crime is high, and public sanitation in need of investment and probably system overhaul. Valparaiso is a port city, with all the attractions and defects of any large port city. It could use another uniting initiative to upgrade itself, so maybe winning the competition for hosting the BBNJ could do just that.

So, maybe Kast and his people exaggerated somewhat the “emergency” nature of the state of the nation he inherited from Boric. But, due to the precarious nature of a medium-sized country like Chile, heavily dependent upon international trade and imports of energy (oil and gas) and vulnerable to the extreme vagaries and forces of nature itself, the new government soon faced what can be termed real emergencies: a steep increase in the price of oil as a result of the US-Iran war, destabilization of trade due to the uncertain ups and downs of tariffs being applied by the Trump administration to Chilean products, and, once again, serious negative effects of a “Super Niño” weather pattern that is leaving unprecedented amounts of rain and snow in the central and northern parts of the country.

The climate-induced emergency is not over, but by the time the current rains stop, the Kast government will have been tested regarding its ability to protect the affected populations and rebuild rapidly the infrastructure destroyed in its path. How effectively and efficiently they are able to repair roads blocked by landslides, bridges washed away by torrents of water, and essential services of electricity, drinking water, health care and schools for children will in the short term determine how Chileans feel about Kast and his team.

The latest round of US tariffs (12.5%) on Chilean imports will make products like salmon, wood panels, cherries, blueberries, grapes and wine more expensive for the US consumer. Chileans are already exporting these products to other markets, but the US tariffs are forcing Chile to ramp up their exports to alternative markets. Of course, the largest alternative is China, which has a free trade agreement with Chile that applies zero tariffs on these same exports.

The latest Trump tariffs on Chilean products is especially irksome to all Chileans, but certainly to Kast himself. He and his Minister of Foreign Affairs have bragged they would have a closer relationship with Trump than Boric, who openly and repeatedly referred in the most negative terms to Trump and his ideas. But as it turns out, so far, it doesn’t seem to matter who leads Chile, nor what position is taken, Trump will do to Chile and Chile’s economy what suits his unsatiable geopolitical reach of the moment.

Chile was one of the first countries to follow the US and other western countries into the wave of free trade agreements. Within the agreement with the US, signed in 2004, Chile decreased its tariffs to zero, and we watched the trade balance with the US turn positive in the US’s favor. Still, in violation of that agreement, Trump initially applied a 10% trariff to Chilean imports, with some important exceptions like copper and lithium. When this tariff was found illegal by the US Supreme Court, and a temporary tariff of 10% also ran out, this new targeted tariff of 12.5% was applied, effective July 24, 2026. 

It’s important to note that 60% of Chile’s exports to the US are copper and lithium; they are exempt from the new tariff of 12.5%.

A closer look at this issue reveals that the tariff of 12.5% on Chile is being justified by a determination of the US Trade Representative’s office, that Chile is not doing enough to reject imports from countries with inexistent or soft regulations against human trafficking and child and forced labor. Plus, the decision suggests that Chile needs to do more to eliminate certain employment practices in the agriculture and fisheries operations where many immigrants are hired, and where working hours (and conditions) are seen by some to be below US standards. What makes the issue more contentious in Chile is that representatives of two Chilean NGOs, working in the area of worker abuse, actually presented accusatorial labor information on this subject to the US government during the tariff negotiations.

Another negotiating team from Washington is expected soon in Santiago, to work through this issue of labor practices and laws. Optimists suggest that this issue simply requires more negotiation to ultimately reduce the tariffs. But these issues, once applied, seem to stick for quite some time, and given that Trump thinks “tariffs are beautiful”, Chile and consumers of these Chilean products will probably have to get used to higher prices.

In spite of these difficulties, Kast seems to have accomplished his first attempt to reform the corporate tax system, through his “National Reconstruction” legislation, that he believes will provide more stability in the financial market and more incentives for investment. To do so, his people were able to hold together a slim majority coalition in the house and senate. At the same time, he pulled back a slew of environmental reviews that were holding up investment projects, for a closer and more expedient consideration of these investments. A first sign of success from these actions would be the reactivation of the housing sector, where construction has been nil for several years. New employment in this sector is badly needed.

Kast’s success with his large legislative package has unsettled the opposition parties, who are so far unsuccessfully trying to organize effectively to slow down the administration’s reform agenda. They have had some success at modifying some parts of the legislation, but they have not stopped it, nor eliminated the core elements. Their attempts to question the legality of some of the proposals through constitutional review has also fallen short. Hence, several student associations and the workers union (CUT) are putting together an agenda of public protests to challenge the Kast administration’s program. For some, this is the natural course of politics in Chile; for others, it looks like a return to the “Octoberism” of the 2019 “estallido” which left much of Santiago and the country with a black eye.

The political opposition is already rallying their forces around a meeting in Santiago in early September of the Foro de Madrid, an international alliance of right-wing leaders, organized not by the Chileans, but by the Fundacion Disenso, aligned with the Spanish political party Vox. This event will attract many of the leaders on the right who Chilean leftists firmly believe are leading the region into a period of anti-democracy governance: Milei of Argentina, Fujimori of Peru, de la Espriella of Colombia, Noboa of Ecuador and Bukele of El Salvador. As a result, this gathering could provide the fuel for a massive protest the opposition in Chile has been yearning for since Kast’s election, but unable to produce. How Kast deals with this event, and how his more extreme supporters participate in the event, could determine if it is just one more gathering of like-minded ideologues, or the cause that helps the left get both feet firmly back in the streets, where they are more comfortable than inside the walls of government.

As usual, the Chilean scene is partially bright, and at the same time ominously cloudy. But regardless of the political slant of Chilean governments, Chileans themselves always seem to do some things right. They haven’t done much right by their national soccer team lately, and “La Roja” not being in the recent World Cup left us all, at the end of the day, rooting for either Spain or Argentina. This was not a very satisfying state of affairs, but for most Chileans, and for this author, it was an easy choice. Viva España!!

Even though, today there is some excitement around soccer in Chile. The fan-favorite goalkeeper of the Cape Verde team, Vozinha, has arrived in Santiago to much fanfare, to play on the “peoples’ team”, Colo Colo. Will this provide the spark to get La Roja back in contention? We shall see.

To all, stay well.

Posted on August 5, 2026, in Leesburg, Virginia

David Joslyn

David Joslyn, after a 45-year career in international development with USAID, Peace Corps, The Inter-American Institute for Cooperation on Agriculture (IICA), The Chicago Council on Global Affairs, and private sector consulting firms, divides his time between his homes in Virginia and Chile. Since 2010, David has been writing about Chile and Chileans, often based upon his experience with the Peace Corps in Chile and his many travels throughout the country with family and friends.