Chilean President Jose Antonio Caste waves to supporters as he leaves Congress after a swearing-in ceremony Wednesday, March 11, 2026, in Valparaiso, Chile. (AP Photo/Gustavo Garello)
Gustavo Garello/AP
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Gustavo Garello/AP
SANTIAGO, Chile – Jose Antonio Caste was sworn in as Chile’s new president today in a ceremony in the coastal city of Valparaiso. The right-wing politician built his career against liberal values from the fringes of Chilean politics.
A. won the cast A great win Against a leftist rival in December’s race, he won 58% of the vote for his hard-line approach to public security and illegal immigration.
His ascension to the presidency marks an abrupt departure from the progressive agenda of leftist Gabriel Boric, whose four-year term ended today.
“Cast will first emphasize certain issues, such as immigration,” said Claudio Fuentes, a political scientist at the University of Diego Portales in Santiago.
“They take a very strong position on controlling the borders, where they will probably increase the presence of the military. Dealing with this is key to their success.”
During the election promotionKast, an ultraconservative Catholic father of nine, avoided all mention of the hardline moral agenda synonymous with his 30-year political career, first as a local councilor and later as a congressman.
Although Chilean society has liberalized since the return to democracy in 1990 following the dictatorship of General Augusto Pinochet, Cast has maintained his position on the right, voting against the limited legalization of abortion and divorce legislation during his time in Congress.
Caste began a four-year term in what he labeled an “emergency” government amid what he cited as a growing security and economic crisis – making Chile one of Latin America’s safest and most prosperous nations.
Throughout his career, Cast frequently faced controversy for his extreme views, including his defense of the Pinochet dictatorship, an issue he campaigned to retain in power when it was put to a major referendum in 1988.
In 2016, he left the right-wing Union Democrata Independent party after 20 years and three terms in Congress, saying it had strayed too far from its founding principles as defenders of the legacy of the dictatorship.
He ran for president as an independent the following year, winning 8% of the vote, and in 2019 founded the Republican Party on the foundation of “the protection of human life from the imagination,” family values, and the market economy.
During his 2021 presidential campaign, in which he won the first round but was convincingly defeated in the runoff by the leftist Boric, he said that if General Pinochet were still alive, the dictator’s vote would have been cast in his favor.
In his native Paine, a quiet farming town south of Santiago, some residents fondly remember the Cast family as a religious clan that built a successful meat and restaurant business.
Kast’s father, Michael Kast, was born in Germany and fought in the Wehrmacht. A member of the Nazi Party, he left post-war Europe for Argentina before eventually settling in Chile.
But others in Paine — where 70 people were forcibly disappeared under the Pinochet dictatorship, more than any other municipality in Chile — are less optimistic about the rise to power of regime supporters.
“Our work, our monuments, our history, it’s all at risk,” said Gerson Ramírez Guajardo, whose father was abducted by soldiers after the 1973 coup and disappeared.
“I think we’re all concerned about what’s to come.”
