Students Protest Kast Administration's Education Budget Cuts in Santiago

Students took to the streets of Santiago on April 29, 2026, in protest against the Kast administration's proposed reductions to the education budget. Demonstrators threw stones at police, who responded with water cannons to disperse the crowd near university campuses in the capital. The mobilization was organized primarily by the Federación de Estudiantes de Chile (FECh) and secondary school student confederations, who called the education cuts an attack on public schooling and universities — framing them as part of a broader fiscal austerity agenda being rolled out by the new right-wing government. The protests marked a rekindling of student movement energy that had largely receded since the post-2019 constitutional process.