As Chile’s left prepares to choose its presidential candidate in a low-profile primary this Sunday, the stakes are higher than they seem. The vote offers a revealing snapshot of an opposition grappling with internal fragmentation, an emboldened right, and a disoriented electorate. Can the left reinvent itself before the 2025 elections?
By Daniel Brieba
This Sunday, June 29, Chileans will vote in a left-wing primary that could shape not only the opposition candidates’ presidential strategies, but also the internal balance of power within Chile’s fragmented governing coalition. While the race has attracted less attention than the high-stakes battles on the right, it may prove to be decisive for the future of the Chilean left—and for the kind of challenge it can mount in the 2025 general elections.
While the race has attracted less attention than the high-stakes battles on the right, it may prove to be decisive for the future of the Chilean left—and for the kind of challenge it can mount in the 2025 general elections.
Until recently, the country appeared headed toward a presidential race defined by predictability. Polls pointed to a likely showdown between center-right Evelyn Matthei and center-left Carolina Tohá—two establishment figures deeply rooted in the post-1990 political consensus. Matthei, a former minister and prominent mayor of an affluent Santiago municipality, and Tohá, a key minister in President Gabriel Boric’s cabinet, seemed to embody a return to political stability after years of disruption.
Their emergence offered a kind of symmetry: two experienced, pragmatic leaders promising moderation and competence. Ironically, their rise suggested that Boric’s Chile was not breaking with the past, but looping back to it—as if, after all the upheaval, voters were reaching once more for a safe pair of hands. The preceding years had brought the explosive 2019 social uprising, two failed constitutional rewrites—one rejected in 2022 as too left-wing, the other in 2023 as too conservative—and a deepening sense of public fatigue with politics.
But what initially looked like a calm reset has given way to something more complex. The center of gravity in both political camps has begun to shift. On the right, José Antonio Kast is gaining ground; on the left, Jeannette Jara of the Communist Party has unexpectedly caught up with Tohá. Rather than stabilizing around the middle, each bloc is now realigning toward figures who are more polarizing—and more distant from the post-transition establishment.
These shifts have occurred within the context of a rightward drift in Chilean public opinion, one that has been building over the past several years. Though voters have alternated between left- and right-leaning governments since 2010, this latest turn is deeper and more sustained. The emphatic rejection of the 2022 constitutional draft—backed by Boric’s administration—signaled not just dissatisfaction with the government, but a broader rejection of the left’s transformative ambitions. Disapproval of the government has remained in the 50–60% range, and Boric’s base has stagnated around 30%. Concerns over violent crime, migration—particularly the visible increase in Venezuelan arrivals—and public security now dominate political discourse. Admiration for El Salvador’s president Nayib Bukele has become a telling symptom of the public mood. When economic concerns surface, the emphasis is on growth and jobs, not redistribution.
These shifts reflect a broader rightward drift in Chilean public opinion, one that has been building over the past several years. Though voters have alternated between left- and right-leaning governments since 2010, this latest turn is deeper and more sustained. The emphatic rejection of the 2022 constitutional draft—backed by Boric’s administration—signaled not just dissatisfaction with the government, but a broader rejection of the left’s transformative ambitions.
In this climate, the right appears poised for a strong showing in 2025—so much so that some polls now suggest a three-way race between Matthei, Kast, and whoever wins the left-wing primary. Kast, a hardline conservative who openly admires figures like Bolsonaro and Orbán, made it to the runoff against Boric in 2021 and has recently overtaken Matthei in some polls. A scenario in which two right-wing candidates advance to the runoff—a situation unprecedented in the post-1990 era—no longer seems implausible.
Against this backdrop, Sunday’s left-wing primary may appear like a sideshow. But that would be a mistake. Much is at stake—not just for the left’s electoral prospects, but for its internal reconfiguration. The current coalition brings together three distinct traditions: the longstanding Communist Party; the newer Frente Amplio, from which Boric emerged; and the traditional social-democratic parties that once dominated the early decades of post-authoritarian democracy. Their agreement to hold a primary was driven more by necessity than by shared purpose: in the face of bleak polling, unity became a survival strategy.
Much is at stake—not just for the left’s electoral prospects, but for its internal reconfiguration.
Though the Frente Amplio has presented its own candidate, the race has effectively narrowed to a contest between Jeannette Jara and Carolina Tohá. Jara, until recently Minister of Labor, built national recognition by brokering a deal with the right that allowed a stalled pension reform to pass. Her campaign has leaned on a grounded, personable style that contrasts with Tohá’s more technocratic demeanor. Despite her Communist Party affiliation, Jara has gained traction by avoiding ideological signaling and emphasizing pragmatic leadership.
Tohá, in turn, is widely viewed as the candidate with the broadest appeal in a general election. As the most prominent social democrat in Boric’s cabinet, she represents the re-entry of Concertación-era figures into government and is seen as a stabilizing force after the administration’s rocky first year. Polls suggest Tohá has a greater potential than Jara to rally an anti-Kast vote in a runoff scenario. But in the current political climate, strategy may count for less than identity and affect. In that sense, Jara’s rise is emblematic of a broader transformation in how political capital is accrued in Chile today.
Chile’s left-leaning voters now face a pivotal choice. Should they vote pragmatically for a centrist who, while facing an uphill battle, offers the clearest hope of holding off the right? Or should they endorse a candidate who reflects the coalition’s prevailing political mood—less associated with the old technocratic center-left, and more attuned to today’s combative, anti-establishment energy—even at the cost of alienating moderate voters?
The dynamics shaping this primary are not unique to Chile. The erosion of partisan loyalties, the discrediting of mainstream political actors, and the rising salience of security and identity are tendencies observable across a range of democracies today. In Latin America, these dynamics have opened new space for the populist right, particularly where concerns about crime, migration, and institutional distrust dominate public debate. Chile’s current cycle reflects this broader volatility—an electorate increasingly untethered from traditional alignments and newly responsive to actors once considered politically marginal.
Daniel Brieba is an Assistant Professor at the School of Government of Universidad Adolfo Ibáñez, Chile. He holds a DPhil in Politics from the University of Oxford and an MPA in Economic and Public Policy from the London School of Economics and Political Science.
