A picture frame with a kind message and smiles all round: was the Colombia-USA meeting at the White House an unalloyed success?
Colombian president Gustavo Petro’s trip to Washington to meet his counterpart Donald Trump seems to have gone very well. The build-up had been pretty good, with Trump praising Petro and both sides avoiding inflammatory rhetoric.
So well did it go, in fact, that Petro ended up with a signed photobook memory of the encounter on first name terms. Trump’s handwritten note said it was a great honour to have met Petro, adding “I love Colombia”. For his part, Petro said his team was looking for solutions and invited Trump to visit Cartagena.
Trump was effusive in his praise for the Colombian president, noting that they had “not exactly been the best friends” but that he never felt offended by Petro’s rhetoric. That’s par for the course with the US leader, as he seems to often make up with people after fierce words. He ended by saying he thought Petro was terrific and they got along great.
From being sworn enemies all through last year and with sharp words exchanged just a month ago peace has broken out with surprising speed between Donald and Gustavo. In a way, it’s more of a frenemy relationship than a bromance, with both realising that it suits them better to work together for the time being.
They’re also quite similar politicians, if polar opposites politically, which means they probably understand each other better than the rest of us do. Long-winded speeches to large rallies of supporters, unpredictable behaviour, constant use of socials – they basically work in the same way towards different ends.
Fears of Petro having to walk into the famed Oval Office bearpit were laid aside the night before when it was confirmed as a behind-closed-doors meeting. That was relatively unsurprising, given the Colombia president’s reluctance to speak English.
Also in the room were the presidents’ teams, including JD Vance and Marco Rubio on the US side. However, Petro made it clear that the reunion was between himself and Trump.
The crux of the meeting was over cocaine exports, which Petro said was mainly organised from abroad, naming Dubai, Madrid and Miami as their ‘capitals’. He said sharing information and working together was key and that he had passed names to the American administration.
An insider speaking to Colombian news source El Tiempo said that they thought Trump had bought the idea that the war on drugs had to be fought against cartel leaders and not campesinos. They said that Trump had said they would go after the bosses.
Venezuela was a topic of conversation too, with both countries looking towards reestablishing relations following the fall of Maduro. For Colombia, that involves controlling the flow of drugs across the long border in the east as well as working on oil and gas exports.
Quito and Bogotá have been engaged in a tit-for-tat tariff war in recent weeks, which is of course Trump’s speciality. He’s agreed to step in and mediate, which is good news for Colombia as he is a key ally of Ecuadorian president Noboa.
This is not full co-operation though, as some important things have yet to be resolved. Petro remains on the Clinton List and he noted that neither himself and Trump were given to changing their ways of thinking about things. Trump mentioned sanctions, but was not clear what that referred to.
Cordial tones and friendly words might not be concrete action, but it’s a significant difference from where we were just a month ago. The USA might not be everyone in Colombia’s favourite country, but it remains a key international relationship with strong links between the nations on many levels.
At the end of the meeting, Petro came out with MAGA hats, not his usual choice of attire. He then later took to socials to show off his customisation – an ‘S’ scrawled after ‘America’. That’s a thankfully restrained and playful take that shouldn’t raise any heckles, but serves to underline the point that for all the warm words, they have sharp differences of opinion.
Making the Americas great again would be in everyone’s best interest and thankfully it seems like they may be able to put egos and differences aside in order to pursue that. If the bonhomie of this week can be converted into meaningful results, it could make a lot of people’s lives better. That’s something to hope for.