Antonio Kast with a thumping victory and his rival quickly conceding defeat. With about 80 percent of the votes counted, Kast had 58 percent of the vote, an unassailable lead over Jeannette Jara, a Communist Party member heading a broad leftist coalition. In central Santiago, Kast supporters beeped car horns, waved flags and cheered a man who once openly defended the bloody dictatorship of Augusto Pinochet. Kast campaigned on promises to expel hundreds of thousands of illegal immigrants, close the northern border, tackle high rates of violent crime and restart a stalled economy. Once one of the safest and most prosperous countries in the Americas, Chile has been hit hard by the Covid-19 pandemic, violent social protests and an influx of organized crime groups. "I have high expectations that he will fix the immigration issue," said 42-year-old social worker Maribel Saavedra. It is the latest victory for Latin America's right, after winning elections in Argentina, Bolivia, Honduras, El Salvador and Ecuador. For Kast, a 59-year-old father of nine, it was a lucky third attempt for the presidency. Jara called Kast to concede defeat, she said on X shortly after first results were released, adding that voters had spoken "loud and clear." (Bssnews)