President José Antonio Kast said in his first radio interview from La Moneda that exceptions will be evaluated case by case in the 3% budget cuts ordered by Hacienda to ministries. He confirmed analyzing salary reductions for executive authorities amid the fuel price crisis. He also backed questioned ministers and defended his emergency government's priorities.
In an interview with the Asociación de Radiodifusores de Chile (ARCHI) on Tuesday, March 31, President José Antonio Kast defended not cutting the Security Ministry's budget, one day after reversing the initial measure affecting Carabineros and PDI.
"[The government] is seeing that everyone carries out the cut exercise and once that's clear, how to establish it, how to present it, we're going to see in which places the cut takes effect and in which not," Kast explained. He assured the 3% is even for all but opened the door to exceptions in key portfolios like Housing, Defense, Health, and Education, per meetings by Finance Minister Jorge Quiroz with the Budget Directorate.
He also confirmed evaluating salary cuts for executive authorities, distinguishing structural from transitory announcements, though changes to his pay require congressional approval, which he ruled out.
Kast backed Security Minister Trinidad Steinert on the removal of retired Prefect Consuelo Peña from PDI, attributing it to the top police authority, Eduardo Cerna. "The decision is of the PDI's top authority," he stated, despite criticism from lawmakers like Senator Iván Flores (DC), who questioned the "institutionalization of the lie." He also defended Women Minister Judith Marín over Priscilla Carrasco's exit from SernamEG.
The president prioritized social urgencies over cultural policies, ruling out ideological battles, and announced modifications to the state of exception in La Araucanía, with restrictions in Temucuicui.
