Early Sunday morning, January 26, Colombian President Gustavo Petro—a long-time ally of the United States—and Donald Trump began a day-long clash where the two heads of state leveled insults, tariffs, and sanctions at one another, as a trade war loomed overhead. By Sunday night, the impasse was over, and both administrations agreed on a solution. What happened, and what does it mean for U.S.–Colombia relations?
Before this incident, Colombia was one of the United States’ closest allies in Latin America, according to a Congressional Research Service report from 2024. The countries cooperated first in combating Colombian revolutionary groups, then in peaceful negotiations, and, subsequently, integrating the revolutionaries into the democratic government. Since 2006, they have shared an ongoing free trade agreement and annual commerce between them is worth approximately fifty billion dollars.
However, since the election of Gustavo Petro, a leftist president leading a coalition government of over 14 parties, Colombia and the United States have experienced a growing conflict. Former President Joe Biden worked on resolving this rift, considering Bogotá one of Washington’s most important partners; he designated it a major non-NATO ally, and called it the “key to the hemisphere.” President Petro, though, has been working to decrease Colombia’s reliance on the United States and the European Union. Petro, who will remain in office until 2026, is central to the recent dispute regarding deportation.
Upon Trump’s return to the White House, his administration rapidly moved to increase immigration enforcement. On January 22, acting Secretary of Defense Robert Sallasses provided military aircrafts to the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) for the purposes of deporting illegal immigrants. The memo published by the Department of Defense (DoD) announcing this measure specified these aircrafts would “support” DHS flights, and that the DoD would also provide inflight law enforcement.
The use of military aircraft for deportation flights has been central to the White House’s messaging, as Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt has posted images of undocumented immigrants entering aircraft in chains.
Early on January 26, Petro turned back two military aircrafts carrying deportees to Colombia. Announcing the action on X, Petro said he would not accept any migrants into Colombia until the US “establish[ed] a protocol for the dignified treatment” of Colombian citizens. Later that morning, Petro, citing a video showing deportees landing in Brazil in handcuffs, said in another social media post that “a migrant is not a criminal and must be treated with the dignity that a human being deserves.”
That afternoon, Trump announced on his personal platform, Truth Social, that this denial “jeopardizes the National Security and Public Safety” of the U.S., necessitating retaliation: immediate 25% tariffs on all Colombian goods entering the U.S., to be raised to 50% in a week, travel bans and visa sanctions on Colombian government officials, and IEEPA treasury, banking, and financial sanctions.
In a lengthy post responding to the threat of tariffs, Petro declared that Colombia would enact 50% tariffs on American goods entering Colombia, raising the issue to a potential trade war. The post also conveyed the Colombian president’s attitude of resistance towards Trump, showing that Petro does not fear deposition from the United States, but believes Trump’s reliance on oil will doom the planet, and refuses to “shake hands with white slavers”—a derogatory term about Trump.
Despite this social media spat, the dispute was resolved by officials working behind the scenes later that night: at around 10 p.m., the White House announced that Colombia had agreed to all of its terms and that the proposed tariffs and sanctions would not be enacted unless Colombia failed to honor the agreement. Shortly after, the Colombian Foreign Ministry announced that it had “overcome the impasse,” and that the Colombian presidential plane would be sent to retrieve the deportees. While not contradicting the White House statement, the Foreign Ministry’s statement did not mention military aircraft, and stated that both parties will work to ensure humane conditions for deportees.
On January 28, two Colombian planes coming from San Diego and El Paso carrying 110 and 91 deportees respectively landed in Bogotá, marking the resolution of the incident. Petro later claimed that he never denied entry of deportees; he only demanded that those deportees be treated with respect, posting on X “we are not anyone’s colony.” Further military flights to Latin American countries continued; Guatemala received at least three, while making no official objection.
The dispute raises questions about how the Trump Administration will handle the delicate relationship between its immigration and economic policies. One of Trump’s major campaign promises was lowering prices of everyday goods for Americans, but the threatened tariffs would have dramatically raised prices of many commodities, particularly coffee–27% of which the United States imports from Colombia.
Additionally, the disagreement strains an already fragile relationship with Colombia, widening a rift that has been developing for years. Other Latin American countries, with whom cooperation remains critical for Trump’s deportation goals and for America’s general security policy, threw their support behind Petro during the conflict. This hints at a deeper divide forming between the United States and Latin America, which will only widen further if Trump fails to change his approach to foreign policy.
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