In Santiago de Chile the news of the definitive expulsion of the Royalist troops from Peru and Upper Peru was at the same time a source of relief and of uneasiness, because, even though it gave a final blow to the danger of a second Reconquest, it conferred an extraordinary military power to Simón Bolívar. This article studies the reactions of the Chilean press in the face of Bolivar's expansionism. It explores the collective creation of a repulsive portrait of Bolívar, which was to play an important role in the condemnation and collapse of his ambition of lifelong rule in the continent.