The results of the first round of the presidential elections in Chile, which took place this Sunday, November 16, largely aligned with the polls, as the two favorites, José Antonio Kast (Republican Party) and Jeannette Jara (left-wing coalition), came out on top. With 99% of the votes counted, Jeannette Jara led the election with 26.9% of the votes, ahead of José Antonio Kast, who received 23.9% of the votes.

The gap between the two main candidates is, however, smaller than expected. In its latest poll on November 14, the CADEM institute predicted a score of 29% for Jeannette Jara and 22% for José Antonio Kast. The results this Sunday are, in a way, a disappointment for the left, which was hoping for a better score to be able to face the unification of the right in the second round.

The vote saw a record participation rate of 85%, the highest since the return of democracy in 1990. These were the first elections where voting was mandatory and voter registration was automated through a census.

In this election, Chileans were also voting to renew the Chamber of Deputies and part of the Senate. Here too, the left is losing ground, losing 16 seats (out of 155) in the Chamber of Deputies to the right. The various right-wing movements total 76 seats, which is slightly insufficient to hold a majority.

The election shows a true "territorialization" of the vote: Jeannette Jara won in the Metropolitan Region of Santiago and in Patagonia. José Antonio Kast performed well overall across the country but led in the agricultural regions of the south-central part of the country. Franco Parisi rose to the top in the mining regions of the North and performed well overall.

The only real surprise of the election is the third-place finish of Franco Parisi, an anti-establishment candidate, who outperformed opinion polls by securing 19.7% of the votes. He thus surpasses Johannes Kaiser (far-right) and Evelyn Matthei (moderate right), both of whom were expected to take third place. Franco Parisi, who defines himself as neither right nor left, managed to achieve a high score thanks to an anti-establishment discourse. His score can partly be explained by a movement of rejection and dissatisfaction among Chileans towards the current political class. Although he probably benefited from the fact that voting was mandatory for the first time in Chile, Franco Parisi also saw his popularity rise in the final weeks of the campaign when he defended the mining sector and addressed issues such as border protection (particularly in the north of the country) and the fight against crime.

The second round will therefore pit, as expected, two opposing models against each other: the model of continuity and progressive left embodied by Jeannette Jara, versus the conservative right and radical change represented by José Antonio Kast. The left-wing candidate has relied on her positive track record as the former Minister of Labor in the Boric government. She led the main reforms (and successes) of the outgoing government, particularly the reduction of weekly working hours, the increase in the minimum wage, and a fairer redistribution of retirement pensions. She promises to go even further if elected president by raising the minimum wage again. José Antonio Kast, on the other hand, has focused his campaign on fighting crime and illegal immigration and has succeeded in making it the main topic of the presidential debates. He proposes radical measures to expel illegal immigrants and takes a very conservative stance on social issues such as abortion.

For many analysts, the results of the first round suggest that José Antonio Kast could win quite easily in the second round, given the transfer of right-wing votes he is expected to receive. As soon as the results were announced, Evelyn Matthei and Johannes Kaiser declared their support for José Antonio Kast. On the other hand, even though Franco Parisi has so far refused to give voting instructions, it seems likely that a majority of his voters will choose to vote for José Antonio Kast, who represents an alternative to Jeannette Jara.

In his Sunday evening speech, José Antonio Kast promised to "rebuild" the country and, in a manner similar to Donald Trump, to carry out mass expulsions of illegal immigrants from the very first days of his term. The election of José Antonio Kast would represent a conservative shift never seen in Chile since the return to democracy in 1990. Until then, Chileans had elected rather moderate right-wing and left-wing heads of state.

Nevertheless, several trends explain the rise of right-wing movements in Chile, which are becoming increasingly radical and conservative. Firstly, the economic and humanitarian crises in Haiti and Venezuela have led to "unusual" migration to Chile, which has now become the main topic of the presidential campaign. For the various right-wing movements, illegal immigration is blamed for the rise in crime in recent years, in a country that is otherwise relatively safe. In Chile, the homicide rate has increased from 2.5 to 6 per 100,000 inhabitants over ten years, and 868 kidnappings were recorded in 2024, a 76% increase compared to 2021. These facts are also widely reported by local media and contribute to exacerbating the feeling of insecurity in the country.

Moreover, the country remains traumatized by the “estadillo social” of October 2019, when demonstrations in favor of greater social justice were violently repressed by the police, resulting in 7 deaths and over 3,000 injuries. This social movement led to a proposal to revise the Constitution and the election in 2021 of Gabriel Boric, representing a new left, described by some as radical. This victory of the progressive Chilean left was perceived by right-wing movements as a threat to their interests and privileges and to the country's economic stability. José Antonio Kast, already a candidate in 2021, claimed at the time that Gabriel Boric would turn the country into a "new Venezuela" through nationalizations of companies and punitive taxes. Four years later, it is clear that these arguments were exaggerated. Nevertheless, they illustrated a growing concern from the Chilean right, which has gradually radicalized by demanding more order in the country and, in particular, more firmness in the face of crime. On this point, José Antonio Kast also claims the legacy of Pinochet's dictatorship.

Barring any surprises, Chile is expected to experience a radical shift to the right on December 14, the date of the second round of the presidential election. This conservative shift also aligns with a regional trend. José Antonio Kast follows in the footsteps of Jair Bolsonaro, Nayib Bukele, Javier Milei, and Daniel Noboa: conservative, even authoritarian presidents who embrace radical rhetoric and methods to combat illegal immigration and crime, while promising better economic conditions through tax cuts.