A far-right candidate forced a runoff in the Colombia\u2019s presidential election on Sunday, in what could herald another gain for the right-wing wave sweeping elections across Latin America, according to preliminary official results.<\/p>\n
The candidate, Abelardo de la Espriella, will now go head to head against Iv\u00e1n Cepeda, a senator from the left-wing party of the country\u2019s outgoing president, Gustavo Petro.<\/p>\n
Mr. De La Espriella, whose rise came late in the campaign, resembles a new breed of flashy populist leaders in Latin America like El Salvador\u2019s Nayib Bukele who share President Trump\u2019s hard-line approach to crime and have pledged to apply it to drug traffickers.<\/p>\n
With more than 99 percent of the votes counted, results<\/a> released by the national civil registry revealed an electorate split down the middle. Mr. De La Espriella got 44.73 percent of the vote, and Mr. Cepeda 40.91 percent. Because neither candidate received more than 50 percent, a runoff will be held on June 21.<\/p>\n Mr. Cepeda, a longtime human rights advocate, managed to hang on to the broad base of support for Mr. Petro\u2019s political project, which has sought to represent poor and disenfranchised populations long left out of the halls of power. Mr. Petro was limited to a single term.<\/p>\n Mr. de La Espriella\u2019s unexpected rise derailed what the Colombian political establishment had believed would be an easy victory for them over Mr. Cepeda. Paloma Valencia, a conservative senator who had the support of some of the country\u2019s most powerful politicians, received just 6.84 percent of the vote on Sunday.<\/p>\n Experts say the results are a startling rebuke to the conservative establishment that has largely governed Colombia, a diverse South American country of 54 million, since its independence more than 200 years ago. Mr. Petro was Colombia\u2019s first leftist leader.<\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s the first time ever that the country is divided between a bloc on the left and a bloc on the right,\u201d said Maria Jimena Duz\u00e1n, a prominent Colombian investigative journalist and political commentator.<\/p>\n With the choice of Colombia\u2019s next leader still up in the air, officials in Washington were expected to watch the next round of voting closely. The Trump administration has been working to advance the right-wing wave<\/a> in Latin America as it seeks allies for its aggressive push against drug traffickers.<\/p>\n Mr. De La Espriella, 47, a lawyer who has never held office, rose in the polls in the final stretch of the campaign by pitching himself as an anti-establishment outsider and stoking fears that the left would turn Colombia into Venezuela, the failed authoritarian state next door.<\/p>\n He also capitalized on widespread security concerns, promising to crack down on the armed groups and gangs that many Colombians say have made extortion a fact of life. In a seeming nod to Mr. Bukele\u2019s prison system<\/a> in El Salvador, Mr. De La Espriella pledged to build 10 maximum-security prisons in the jungle.<\/p>\n Mr. Cepeda, 63, is a staunch ally of Mr. Petro\u2019s who ran on a platform of continuity and a promise to defend victims of the country\u2019s armed conflicts, as well as the poor. While experts say Mr. Cepeda benefited from the left\u2019s strong base \u2014 and a recent, sizable increase to the minimum wage \u2014 it was not clear if his reserved personality and policy-focused speeches would appeal to voters the way Mr. Petro\u2019s galvanizing presence did.<\/p>\n \u201cPetro paved the way for someone who isn\u2019t charismatic like him, but who is more substantive,\u201d said Eduardo Ayala, a political scientist who attended a rally for Mr. Cepeda in the capital, Bogot\u00e1.<\/p>\n Many of Mr. De La Espriella\u2019s supporters echoed their candidate\u2019s claim that Mr. Cepeda would be more radical than Mr. Petro. \u201cIt would be a disaster,\u201d said Klaudia Rinc\u00f3n, an eighth-grade math teacher from Barranquilla, the coastal Caribbean city where Mr. De La Espriella cast his vote, as she headed to the polls. \u201cTotal communism.\u201d<\/p>\n Voters, commenters and analysts agreed that the election had been like no other in living memory.<\/p>\n Mr. De La Espriella\u2019s campaign combined old-fashioned populism with new stunts like A.I.-generated videos realistically depicting his political rivals plotting against him. To get around a rule against wearing campaign garb to the polls, his supporters were told to wear the canary-yellow jersey of Colombia\u2019s national soccer team.<\/p>\n Many voters said on Sunday that despite Mr. De La Espriella\u2019s bombast, they were reassured by his running mate, Jos\u00e9 Manuel Restrepo, a seasoned economist who was finance minister under a previous conservative president, Iv\u00e1n Duque.<\/p>\n The right\u2019s vote, which was split between Mr. De La Espriella and Ms. Valencia, could coalesce around the far-right candidate in the second round. Experts said that centrist voters might move toward the left in the runoff, but that Mr. Cepeda would need to assure them that he would not move to nationalize industries or otherwise adopt far-left measures that would affect the economy.<\/p>\n He faces an uphill battle, not only because of anti-left sentiment but because of disappointment in many quarters with Mr. Petro, whose term was marked by personal and government scandals and runaway spending that left a debt of pandemic-era levels, economists said.<\/p>\n In Mr. De La Espriella he faces a flashy figure who captivated a broad following with virtuosic speeches delivered from a bulletproof box, a tiger mascot and a catchy slogan of \u201cFirme por la Patria!\u201d (\u201cStanding Strong for the Homeland!\u201d)<\/p>\n The spectacle seemed to eclipse for many his lack of experience.<\/p>\n \u201cHe looks like an intelligent guy,\u201d said Silvia Garcia, 67, a retired interpreter for international conferences, who voted for the candidate in Barranquilla, predicting he would build a strong cabinet.<\/p>\n Many voters appeared to overlook the controversies that have followed Mr. De La Espriella for the length of his career, including scrutiny over his relationship to notorious Colombian clients such as Alex Saab, a close ally of Venezuela\u2019s former leader, who has been extradited to the United States<\/a>.<\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s like a doctor treating a criminal, a guerrilla, or a paramilitary,\u201d a voter in Bogot\u00e1, Fabi\u00e1n Campos, said of Mr. De La Espriella\u2019s legal career. \u201cIf it\u2019s your job, you provide the service.\u201d<\/p>\n Turnout was high on Election Day, and international observers said there had been no major problems despite predictions of fraud on both sides, and threats and violent attacks on the campaign trail, including the fatal shooting of two De La Espriella campaign workers.<\/p>\n Esteban Gonz\u00e1lez Pons, head of the European Union\u2019s election observation mission in Colombia, called the electoral process \u201corderly, calm, transparent, and fluid.\u201d<\/p>\n There was an unusually large turnout among Colombians living abroad, with the majority of voters in the United States voting for Mr. De La Espriella, results showed. In Miami-Dade County, Fla., voters had lined up starting days ago outside the consulate, many in yellow jerseys and shouting his campaign slogans.<\/p>\n In many ways, the vote was a referendum on the legacy of the departing president, Mr. Petro.<\/p>\n Mr. Petro\u2019s term was defined by the historic representation of Indigenous, Afro-Colombian and L.G.B.T.Q. communities, but also by a a stalled legislative agenda, digressive public speeches and a rocky relationship with Mr. Trump. <\/p>\n William Pineda, a cargo truck driver from outside Bogot\u00e1, said he viewed Mr. Cepeda as the next phase in a project that was on the side of the poor and vulnerable for the first time in the nation\u2019s history.<\/p>\n \u201cHe wants to help the common people, so the rich aren\u2019t always calling the shots,\u201d he said. <\/p>\n The central role of Colombia in the region\u2019s drug trade makes it a key piece in Mr. Trump\u2019s campaign to eradicate cartels<\/a> with the collaboration of allied regional governments.<\/p>\n Mr. De La Espriella has said he would pursue an agreement similar to one reached by neighboring Ecuador, which has agreed to allow U.S. forces to engage in joint operations in its territory. <\/p>\n Mr. Cepeda, on the other hand, closed his campaign saying<\/a> he wished to end the \u201cviolent cycle\u201d of military attacks on armed groups and retaliation. He has often spoken of the failed decades-long drug war waged by the United States.<\/p>\n Federico Rios, Jorge Valencia and Andrea Zarate contributed reporting.<\/p>\n