Far-left President of Colombia Gustavo Petro accused President Donald Trump of being “rude and ignorant” to Colombia after Trump called him an “illegal drug dealer” on Sunday.
The Colombian government claimed that Trump’s remarks are a “direct threat” to Colombian national sovereignty.
In a Truth Social post on Sunday, President Trump accused Petro of being an “illegal drug leader strongly encouraging the massive production of drugs” in Colombia and denounced that Petro’s administration has done nothing to stop drug trafficking despite the United States’ large scale payments and subsidies. As a result, President Trump announced that he would suspend all U.S. payments and subsidies to Colombia.
“The purpose of this drug production is the sale of massive amounts of product into the United States, causing death, destruction, and havoc,” President Trump wrote. “Petro, a low rated and very unpopular leader, with a fresh mouth toward America, better close up these killing fields immediately, or the United States will close them up for him, and it won’t be done nicely. Thank you for your attention to this matter!”
In remarks to reporters, President Trump reiterated that he would stop all funding to Colombia over its cocaine production, describing the “out-of-control” country as a “drug manufacturing machine.” Trump described Petro as the “worst president they’ve ever had” and a “lunatic.”
“I used to complain about it when they had a very nice president, but he wasn’t doing it. It was all talk. They are a drug manufacturing machine, Colombia, and we’re not gonna be part of it,” Trump said. “So we’re gonna drop all the money that we’re giving to them. It has nothing to do with them stopping drug production.”
“And you look at the fields, The fields are loaded up with drugs, and they refine the drugs, and they make tremendous amounts of cocaine, and they send it all over the world, and they destroy families,” he continued. “No, Colombia is out of control, and now they have the worst president they’ve ever had. He’s a lunatic who’s got a lot of problems, mental problems.”
Petro first responded to Trump in a social media post accusing the U.S. President of being “rude and ignorant with Colombia” and told him to read One Hundred Years of Solitude, a novel by leftist late Colombian writer Gabriel García Márquez, assuring Trump that he “would learn something from solitude.”
“I don’t do business like you. I am a socialist. I believe in helping others, in the common good, and in the common assets of humanity, the greatest of which is life itself, which is being endangered by your oil,” Petro’s message read. “If I am not a businessman, much less a drug trafficker, there is no greed in my heart.”
“I have never been able to understand greed. A mafioso is a human being who embodies the best of capitalism: greed. I am the opposite, a lover of life and therefore a millennial warrior for life. Greed flees from us because life is more powerful,” he continued.
In a separate post, the Colombian president claimed that Trump is being “misled by his inner circle and advisors,” proclaiming himself as the “main enemy of drug trafficking in Colombia in the 21st century.”
“I recommend that Trump take a good look at Colombia and determine where the drug traffickers are and where the democrats are,” Petro wrote.
The Colombian Foreign Ministry rejected President Trump’s “offensive and rude” remarks in a separate official statement, claiming that Trump’s comments were a “direct threat to national sovereignty” in which he accuses the Colombian president “without any basis.”
“These accusations constitute an act of the utmost gravity and are contrary to the dignity of the President of Colombia, who has tirelessly led the fight against drug trafficking in our country,” the Ministry claimed. “During his years in office, he has achieved the largest seizures of illicit drugs ever made in recent history, in addition to promoting a comprehensive effort to eradicate the scourge of drugs throughout the region.”
Foreign Minister Rosa Yolanda Villavicencio announced on Monday morning that Petro recalled his ambassador to the U.S., Daniel García-Peña, for consultations in Bogotá and will announce “the decisions taken in this regard” in the coming hours.
Petro is a proud former member of the Marxist M19 terrorist group and Colombia’s first leftist president ever. He is presently in the final year of his administration and has no possibility for reelection. Petro is also an outspoken advocate for the legalization of cocaine — a drug that, under his administration, has seen record-breaking production levels in Colombia according to the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC).
Petro has been accused by former members of his administration of allegedly suffering from drug addiction. At press time, the Colombian Congress maintains an open inquiry into Petro based on accusations publicly issued by his former Foreign Minister Alvaro Leyva in two letters published between April and May, in which Leyva strongly urged Petro to resign from the presidency in light of his alleged drug issues. In late September, Leyva reportedly ratified his accusations against Petro in an extensive 33-page report submitted to Congress, urging Petro to take medical and toxicology tests.
Throughout 2025, the Colombian president has single-handedly strained Colombia’s over 200-year-old friendly relations with the United States by holding an antagonistic stance against President Trump’s administration; first over Trump’s policies and crackdown against illegal migration and, more recently, in response to Trump’s ongoing drug-fighting efforts in Caribbean international waters.
Petro’s hostilities towards Trump and the United States dramatically escalated over the past weeks after Petro accused Trump of allegedly being an “accomplice” in the “genocide” in Gaza during his extremely unhinged September speech at the United Nations General Assembly, in which he also accused Trump of “murder” through the United States’ military strikes against drug-laden vessels in Caribbean international waters. Days later, Petro publicly called for the U.S. military to disobey Trump as commander-in-chief, resulting in the U.S. State Department revoking Petro’s U.S. visa. Petro responded to the loss of his U.S. visa by doubling down on his accusations against Trump and demanding that Trump is prosecuted for his alleged role in the “genocide” in Gaza.
Christian K. Caruzo is a Venezuelan writer and documents life under socialism. You can follow him on Twitter here.
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