"Long Live Liberty, Damn it!"

This weekend’s dramatic election in Chile sent shockwaves across Latin America. After years of social unrest, rising crime, and deep frustration with left‑wing governance, Chilean voters delivered a huge and decisive political shift with a landslide victory for conservative presidential candidate Jose Antonion Kast, a clear message from millions of Chileans who are exhausted by instability, violence, and economic stagnation.

Across Latin America, a profound shift is underway. After decades marked by the heavy hand of centralized control, economic stagnation, and the social fractures brought on by socialist and communist governance, many nations are beginning to chart a different course.

In Ecuador, El Salvador, Bolivia, Argentina and now Chile, the people have recognized that the centralized power of communism and socialism have brought rising crime, widespread poverty, and waves of violent protests, destabilizing daily life. Citizens watched their currencies collapse, their streets become unsafe, their institutions lose credibility and their opportunities for a better life vanish under leftist rule.

Today, the people are attempting a painful but necessary course correction. Reversing decades of damage in this failed ideological experiment will not be easy but the willingness to confront reality is itself a sign of hope.

For the United States, these events offer a powerful warning.

Nations do not lose prosperity overnight. Decline happens slowly, through policies that expand government power, weaken accountability, and erode the freedoms that make growth possible. It happens when people assume “it can’t happen here”. Many of us recognized that we were headed down the same path and needed a course correction which is why President Trump was elected in a decisive victory, reversing the direction the Democrats were taking our country in. President Trump is focused on reducing the size of the federal government, addressing crime in major cities, curbing mass illegal immigration, and tackling corruption, fraud, and waste within federal agencies and the left is fighting him every step of the way.

Let us stay strong and continue down the path of freedom. Let us learn from the mistakes of others so we do not repeat them. Let us stand with nations fighting to rebuild and let us recommit ourselves to the principles that create liberty, peace, prosperity, and opportunity for all. The future is ours to shape if we have the wisdom to act.

Carol Pefley
Candidate for Ca State Assembly