Chile Crime Fighter Emerges as Left-Wing’s Presidential Favorite
(Bloomberg) -- Chile Interior Minister Carolina Toha is the current favorite among potential center-left contenders in this year’s presidential election, an early poll showed, as tensions mount over which candidates the coalition will put forth in the coming months.
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Roughly 15.3% of voters would back Toha for the nation’s top job, according to LatAm Pulse, a survey conducted by AtlasIntel for Bloomberg News and published Friday. That puts her ahead of government spokeswoman Camila Vallejo, at 12.6%, and Santiago Metropolitan Region Governor Claudio Orrego with 3.4%.
Toha trails front-runner Evelyn Matthei, a lifelong center-right politician who has previously run for president and had the backing of 20.3% of respondents. She ties with Johannes Kaiser, a hard-right lower house deputy, and beats out Jose Antonio Kast, an ultra-conservative who last ran for president in 2021.
The survey is the first to show Toha ranking second in the open race to lead one of Latin America’s richest economies. A former government spokeswoman and lower house deputy, she now oversees Chile’s public security strategy as minister.
The poll comes as parties in President Gabriel Boric’s coalition delay formal nominations for a candidate to succeed the onetime student protest leader who is struggling with low popularity and stiff political opposition.
Toha’s position has made her one of the country’s most visible officials. She makes frequent appearances to showcase new technology and other investments in Chile’s fight against crime and clandestine migration, issues that rank among voters’ top concerns ahead of the November election. Toha also routinely appears in Congress to push the administration’s legislation on those matters, and scored a victory last month when lawmakers approved the creation of a Public Security Ministry.
The poll suggests Toha has weathered a scandal involving one of her former undersecretaries, Manuel Monsalve, who stepped down last year and was charged with rape. Detractors say Toha reacted too slowly to the accusations.
Roughly 47% of respondents said insecurity, crime and drug trafficking are among the most important problems facing Chile, the poll showed. Those concerns have many voters eyeing opposition candidates for the presidency, with critics saying government efforts are too little, too late.
There’s a greater frequency of violent crimes in Chile than before, a trend that is fueling the public’s negative perceptions, Toha said in a June interview with Bloomberg News.
She attributed that shift to factors like the strengthening of organized crime since the Covid-19 pandemic, the weakening of Chilean institutions after a period of social unrest in 2019 and efforts from some gangs to take advantage of waves of regional migration.
Any presidential primaries will take place on June 29, according to the government’s electoral body, Servel. The first round vote will be on Nov. 16 and the run-off, if needed, would take place in December.
Boric cannot seek reelection because Chilean laws forbid presidents from seeking consecutive terms.
AtlasIntel surveyed 1,799 people in Chile between Dec 26-31. The poll has a confidence level of 95% and a margin of error of plus or minus two percentage points.
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