Welcome back to Foreign Policy’s Latin America Brief.

The highlights this week: Colombia elects a far-right firebrand as its next president, an earthquake shakes Venezuela, and health researchers praise Uruguay’s marijuana policy.

Deciphering De La Espriella

True to polls, far-right businessman and lawyer Abelardo de la Espriella won Colombia’s presidential election on Sunday. He is the latest in a string of right-wing, U.S.-aligned candidates to be elected in Latin America. U.S. President Donald Trump was vocal about Colombia’s vote, endorsing de la Espriella on social media.

Last week, U.S. immigration authorities detained a Colombian immigrant based in the United States who had publicly criticized de la Espriella. A U.S. State Department memo cited the immigrant’s political speech while laying out grounds for his deportation, the New York Times reported.

Meanwhile, some Democratic U.S. lawmakers published an open letter calling for an investigation into connections between the president-elect and apparent shell companies in the United States. (De la Espriella lived in Miami for years and is a U.S. and Italian citizen.)

De la Espriella has vowed to work closely with the Trump administration, joining its Shield of the Americas anti-gang initiative and saying that he will reprise the Plan Colombia security cooperation agreement. He also promised “the construction of megaprisons, an end to peace talks with armed groups, and an all-out war against criminal organizations,” Christina Noriega wrote in Foreign Policy.

There are a few uncertainties hanging over de la Espriella’s agenda, however. One is the fact that his margin of victory was some 250,000 votes, less than a percentage point ahead of left-wing candidate Iván Cepeda, who conceded on Wednesday. Cepeda received more votes than outgoing left-wing President Gustavo Petro did when he was elected in 2022.

Colombia is polarized along almost exactly the same geographic breakdown that defined the 2022 election, according to Michael Weintraub, a political scientist at the University of the Andes. The country’s left wing picked up support in a handful of rural districts and lost it in some urban ones.

Perhaps perceptive of his slim margin of victory, de la Espriella said in his victory speech that he would respect the rights of Colombians who did not vote for him. That was a step back from his aggressive campaign rhetoric, in which he pledged to “disembowel” political opponents.

De la Espriella’s party lacks a congressional majority, with Colombia’s Congress split fairly evenly among left-wing, right-wing, and centrist or ideologically ambiguous lawmakers. Still, the president-elect has suggested that he will enact his security and economic agenda by signing executive decrees. On foreign policy, the he has more leeway.

De la Espriella’s entry into the Shield of the Americas may make the informal group Washington’s preferred venue for convening with Latin American leaders. U.S. officials have also engaged through the Organization of American States (OAS), which—unlike the Shield of Americas—includes Canada and other governments that have voiced resistance to Trump’s policies, such as Brazil and Mexico.

However, Trump has not earmarked funding for the OAS next year, suggesting that it could lose support from its biggest donor. Trump’s ambassador to the organization said it should be more active at countering drug cartels and criticized its human rights work as ideologically driven. The Trump administration has reportedly removed several top U.S. diplomats stationed at the OAS.

The OAS’s annual assembly was held this week in Panama. Its secretary-general did not mention the indirect U.S. threats to the organization during his main speech, instead praising new funding from observer states in Europe. Multilateralism “is a requirement for our survival,” he said.

Upcoming Events

Friday, Jun…