President Donald Trump wasted no time firing back at Colombian President Gustavo Petro after Petro's remarks calling for Trump to be “gotten rid of” amid rising tensions over U.S. counternarcotics operations in the region.
Petro, speaking to Univision on Monday, suggested that the best way to change U.S. policy toward Latin America was by "getting rid of Trump." His remarks, accompanied by a snap of his fingers, raised eyebrows and set the stage for Trump’s heated response.
Trump, never one to shy away from confrontation, didn’t hold back. In a fiery response, he called Petro “a thug and bad guy,” accusing him of being deeply involved in the drug trade. “He’s a guy that is making a lot of drugs,” Trump said, adding that Petro better “watch it” because the U.S. would “take very serious action against him and his country.”
Trump also made it clear that he had already taken a strong stance by halting all U.S. payments to Colombia, signaling his frustration with Petro’s handling of drug trafficking and his growing ties with Venezuela’s Nicolás Maduro. "We’ll take very serious action against him and his country," Trump warned, underscoring the tension that has been brewing between the two nations.
This exchange comes amid a larger backdrop of Petro’s increasingly strained relationship with the U.S. government. Once a close ally in the fight against drug cartels, Petro has recently distanced Colombia from American influence, even aligning himself more closely with the socialist regime of Nicolás Maduro in Venezuela. Wes Tabor, former head of the DEA's office in Caracas, pointed out that Petro’s shift toward socialism and Marxism has become more pronounced, leading to a deeper rift with the U.S.
Petro has also been vocal about the recent U.S. military operations in the Caribbean, accusing the U.S. of mistakenly killing a fisherman during an airstrike on drug cartel vessels, rather than taking out narco-traffickers. Trump responded to Petro's accusations with a clear warning: if the Colombian government didn’t change course, new tariffs would be imposed.
The tension is undeniable, and with U.S. forces actively targeting drug cartels in the Caribbean and Petro openly aligning with anti-American forces, it’s clear that the relationship between the U.S. and Colombia is at a breaking point. Trump’s message to Petro couldn’t be clearer: cross the line, and there will be consequences. Let's see how this saga unfolds.
