Colombia on the Brink: The Far-Right’s Ascent and the Threat of Darkness

By Solidario GB | London, June 2026

The Latin American continent holds its breath. The far-right has taken another step in its relentless march across the region, and this time the blow has landed in Colombia. Abelardo de la Espriella, the extreme right-wing candidate, appears to have won the presidency by a margin of just 250,000 votes — the narrowest in the country’s electoral history — bringing to power an ideology that is neither traditional conservatism nor the media showmanship of a Milei. It is something far more dangerous: a doctrine of violence, intimidation, and paramilitary terror.

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A Candidate with Blood on His Hands

While international headlines celebrate “the triumph of the right” in Colombia, the country’s progressive forces know the true nature of the new president-elect. De la Espriella is no conventional politician. He is a man who has promised to “disembowel” his opponents, who labels his internal enemies as “rats and cockroaches,” and who has openly praised the Zionist genocide in Gaza, suggesting that Colombia should adopt the same tactics against its own population.

But these are not merely words. Days before the 21 June runoff, Senator Iván Cepeda, candidate of the Pacto Histórico and a member of the Progressive International, lodged a formal criminal complaint with both the Colombian Attorney General’s Office and the International Criminal Court (ICC). The charges are grave: financing paramilitary terrorism and illicit enrichment.

Cepeda’s complaint alleges that De la Espriella maintained extensive ties with the United Self-Defense Forces of Colombia (AUC), the paramilitary group that has terrorised the country for decades and murdered nearly 100,000 Colombians. At the heart of the accusations is FIPAZ (Fundación Iniciativas por la Paz), an NGO created by De la Espriella in 2004 which, according to the complaint, functioned as a paramilitary front group. FIPAZ was allegedly both financed by the AUC and served as a vehicle through which De la Espriella channelled resources back to the armed group, playing a “dual role”: being financed by paramilitarism and financing it in turn.

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International Backing: Israel, the US, and the Regional Right

It is no coincidence that De la Espriella has received the explicit endorsement of both Israel and its backers in Washington. The US administration knows its new ally well: De la Espriella is a card-carrying member of the Mar-a-Lago set, Donald Trump’s private club in Florida.

According to a recent letter from a group of US Members of Congress, the candidate is linked to at least 14 Florida-based shell companies and several multi-million dollar real estate purchases in the state. Evidence suggests that at least one transaction may have been partly funded by Alex Saab, a Colombian-Venezuelan businessman currently under indictment for money laundering in the United States, who is also a friend and former client of De la Espriella.

Donald Trump was among the first international leaders to congratulate De la Espriella, even before the final results are announced later this week, posting on Truth Social: “He Won, BIG!” and calling him personally to extend his congratulations. He was joined by regional right-wing leaders including Argentina’s Javier Milei, Ecuador’s Daniel Noboa, and Chile’s José Antonio Kast.

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The Threat to Colombian Democracy

What lies ahead for Colombia is dark. De la Espriella has promised to dismantle the separation of powers and rule by decree if his agenda faces resistance. He has vowed to tear up the peace process and wage war against social movement leaders, Afro-Colombian and Indigenous communities, peasants, and trade unionists. He is already aligning with Trump on a security cooperation agenda that will put hundreds of thousands of lives at risk.

This is not just Colombia’s problem. It is the hemisphere’s most dangerous expression of the new far-right.

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The Resistance Continues

Many people on the ground in Bogotá throughout the campaign, documenting foreign interference from the United States, exposing systematic vote-buying, and defending the popular sovereignty of the Colombian people. They stood alongside Cepeda and the Pacto Histórico in their fight against disinformation, foreign intervention, and the millions of dollars mobilised against them. They came within reach of victory.

But now the hardest phase begins. In the weeks and months ahead, the struggle for the country’s democracy and for the basic rights of those who oppose De la Espriella’s project of violence will intensify. Every decree, every crackdown, every attempt to dismantle what Colombians have built will become a battlefield.

Solidario GB will also be there: defending the constitution, monitoring abuses, standing with the popular and revolutionary forces who refuse to surrender. We will track every attack on Colombia’s democratic order and fight to ensure that this doctrine of death dies at Colombia’s borders and advances no further.

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A Call for International Solidarity

The rise of De la Espriella is not an isolated event. It is part of a continental pattern: the far-right advances, financed by foreign interests, backed by imperial power, and fuelled by hatred and fear. But history has taught us that such darkness also generates its own resistance.

From Solidario GB, we call on the international community not to look away. What happens in Colombia today could happen tomorrow in any corner of Latin America. Solidarity is not a gesture; it is a strategic necessity.

The struggle continues. And we will not surrender.

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Solidario GB – For a class perspective from the heart of the Empire.