Inside Colombia’s Crisis Over Trump’s Deportations

Colombia’s president, early on Sunday, announced that he had turned back two American military planes carrying deportees from the United States, setting off an extraordinary crisis inside and outside his country as he infuriated President Trump and caught even his own inner circle off guard.

President Gustavo Petro’s friends — and even his most powerful political adversary, former President Álvaro Uribe — quickly jumped in, working contacts in Washington to help defuse a crisis that threatened to devastate Colombia’s economy and upend relations in the region.

Late on Sunday, after moments when the tense discussions between the two countries appeared on the verge of breaking down, the White House announced that the Colombian government had agreed to receive all deportation flights, including military planes. The Colombian Foreign Ministry soon said “the impasse” had been overcome.

“Despite the difficulties we had, it’s proof that diplomatic channels continue to be the best way to sort out differences,” said Colombia’s ambassador to the United States, Daniel García-Peña, who was in Bogotá, the capital, on Sunday.

He was part of a small group that for several hours managed Mr. Petro on one line and the Trump administration, through its special envoy to Latin America, Mauricio Claver-Carone, on another.

On Monday, Mr. García-Peña said he hoped the “U.S.-Colombia relationship cannot only continue throughout this new administration” but flourish. But on Sunday, that prospect seemed far off.

For many of those involved, the day began around 4 a.m. with their phones ringing constantly. Mr. Petro had just posted a message on social media.

“The U.S. cannot treat Colombian migrants like criminals,” he said, announcing that he was withdrawing authorization for U.S. military planes to land in Colombia.

At 9:30 a.m., Mr. Petro said he had turned military planes back. (The Trump administration said two military flights had been forced to return to the United States.)

The tensions built over the day.

Mr. Trump retaliated by saying he would hit Colombia with 25 percent tariffs, rising to 50 percent within days, as well as a raft of financial and banking sanctions. He also suspended visas for all government officials and their associates. “These measures are just the beginning,” Mr. Trump wrote.

Mr. Petro responded by saying he would impose sanctions on the United States, too. “You will never dominate us,” he declared.

Colombia’s recently appointed foreign minister, Laura Sarabia, called for “calm.”

Gustavo Bolívar, who directs social services programs for the Petro administration, said the president reached out to him after Mr. Trump’s retaliatory moves. Mr. Bolivar shared his concerns that economic sanctions would harm Colombian businesses, he said.

At least three former presidents, including Mr. Uribe, a right-wing leader who has long been at odds with Mr. Petro, also offered to help navigate the storm. One official with knowledge of the events said that Mr. Uribe had called Ms. Sarabia and said, essentially: We have differences with President Petro. He made a mistake. But we need to resolve this. How can I help?

Ms. Sarabia urged Mr. Uribe to call his friends in Washington, including the new secretary of state, Marco Rubio.

The accounts of some of the discussions within the Petro government and with the Trump administration are based in part on interviews with an official in Mr. Petro’s government and with a departing high-ranking official. The two officials requested anonymity to describe sensitive discussions.

Republican senators in the United States also weighed in, urging the Trump administration to show restraint, according to the two officials.

In Colombia, members of Mr. Petro’s inner circle warned that American sanctions could cause widespread damage to the country. The United States is Colombia’s largest trading partner, with key industries like oil, coffee and flowers reliant on the U.S. market.

Mr. Petro, a former rebel and avowed leftist, is already facing significant challenges, including an eruption of violence near the Venezuelan border involving a rebel group. The unrest is threatening to unravel his promise of bringing lasting peace to a country that has known decades of conflict.

Mr. Petro’s confrontation with the Trump administration, and the prompt backlash from the newly sworn-in president, came as Latin American governments are struggling to respond to American pressure to cooperate with measures to curb migration, including stepped-up deportations. At the same time, they are trying to assure their citizens that they will protect their rights.

Mr. Petro announced that he was barring military deportation flights after reports from Brazil over the weekend that 88 people on a flight from the United States, including some families, had endured conditions that the Brazilian government described as “unacceptable” and “degrading.” The deportees had arrived on a nonmilitary plane that malfunctioned and made an emergency landing in Manaus, a city in the Amazon rainforest.

Luis Gilberto Murillo, Colombia’s outgoing foreign minister, who was closely involved in the negotiations with the U.S. government on Sunday, said in an interview that Mr. Petro had two reasons for blocking the U.S. flights. “The first and most important,” he said, “was the dignified treatment of Colombians. He does not agree with people being in handcuffs on those flights.”

The other issue was the use of military planes, he said.

Mr. Petro was not fully aware of a recent change under the Trump administration that allows military aircraft to be used for deportations, Mr. Murillo said. In the past, migrants being deported have been transported on planes that resemble commercial craft and are operated by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement.

Mr. García-Peña said Colombian officials relented on Sunday when U.S. officials assured them that Colombians aboard deportation flights would not be placed in handcuffs after they were returned and would be escorted by Department of Homeland Security officials, not military personnel.

They were also told Colombian citizens would not be photographed aboard the flights, he said.

Mr. Trump’s press secretary shared images last week of people in shackles being led onto military planes. “President Trump is sending a strong and clear message to the entire world: if you illegally enter the United States of America, you will face severe consequences,” she wrote.

Mr. Trump described the deportees as “criminals.”

The use of military planes to transport people expelled from the United States, which Mr. Trump authorized through an executive order, has emerged as a key part of fulfilling a campaign promise to carry out sweeping deportations. But the Trump administration has also made clear that it would not dispatch military planes without the approval of the receiving country.

The acting defense secretary, Robert Salesses, said military planes would be used to transport more than 5,000 people in the custody of the U.S. Border Patrol.

Two military planes arrived on Friday in Guatemala, carrying 160 migrants who had been apprehended after crossing the border, including women and children.

Several Latin American governments have expressed concern over the treatment of migrants being deported now. “What happened on this flight was a violation of rights,” said Macaé Evaristo, Brazil’s minister of human rights, hours before Mr. Petro spoke out.

Honduras has also invoked the need to protect its citizens and Mexico’s president, Claudia Sheinbaum, said: “What do we ask for? Respect for human rights.”

Experts say Mr. Trump’s hard-line response to Mr. Petro may have a chilling effect on other leaders in the region as they weigh their own actions.

Mr. Trump’s swift threat to impose major tariffs on Colombia, which has historically been the strongest United States ally in the region, signals that his migration agenda will be the top priority in diplomatic relationships in the hemisphere, said Will Freeman, a fellow for Latin America studies at the Council on Foreign Relations.

“A previous administration that saw that as one concern among others would probably be walking much more carefully now with Colombia,” said Mr. Freeman. “But I think the fact that Trump is doing this really shows that he sees it as his No. 1 priority.”

For now, Colombia seems intent on avoiding another fight with the United States.

“We will have clear protocols, so that this doesn’t happen again,” said Mr. Murillo, the outgoing foreign minister.

The Trump administration was clearly satisfied with the outcome of its brief if intense feud with Colombia. “America is respected again,” it said.

While Colombia stood to lose more than the United States if tariffs had been imposed by both countries, experts say that alienating Colombia, an important asset for American business, could push it closer to China, its second-largest trading partner, which is making inroads across Latin America.

As Mr. Trump and Mr. Petro’s feud escalated on Sunday, China’s ambassador to Colombia said on social media that the two countries “are in the best moment of our diplomatic relations.”

Caught in the middle were the Colombian deportees who had been in the air on their way to Colombia when Mr. Petro turned the military planes back. Some were said to be arriving in Colombia as early as Monday night on a Colombian government plane.

Mr. Petro was still posting his opinions.

“The solution to illegal migration,” he wrote, “is not simply to deport people and criminalize them.”

Reporting was contributed by Jorge Valencia from Bogotá. Federico Rios from Medellín and Emiliano Rodríguez Mega from Mexico City.