U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio on Tuesday began a new tour of Latin America, starting with an official visit to Colombia where he will meet with conservative President Abelardo de la Espriella.
Rubio’s three-day trip will see the Secretary visit key U.S. partners Colombia, Ecuador, and Peru to meet respectively with Presidents de la Espriella, Daniel Noboa, and Keiko Fujimori.
The State Department detailed last week that Rubio’s agenda will include discussions on U.S. support for Colombia’s earthquake response, further regional cooperation in the shared fight against narco-terrorism, and deeper commercial relationships between the U.S. and the three Latin American countries.
“Throughout the trip, the Secretary will reaffirm the Trump Administration’s commitment to a secure, prosperous, and democratic Western Hemisphere,” State Department Spokesperson Thomas Pigott said.
Rubio’s upcoming encounter with de la Espriella occurs roughly one month after the new Colombian conservative President was inaugurated in August. The Colombian Foreign Ministry confirmed the encounter on Monday and detailed that President de la Espriella and Foreign Minister Omar Bula will receive Sec. Rubio at the city of Barranquilla to “revitalize” bilateral relations between the United States and Colombia.
Minister Bula detailed in a brief video published on Tuesday morning that Rubio is the first high-level visit that President de la Espriella is receiving as a sign of the “reconstruction” of the alliance between Colombia and the United States, the country’s main regional partner.
The foreign minister summarized that the three main areas to be discussed with Secretary Rubio include the U.S. plan to help in the fight against narco-terrorism and organized transnational crime, trade relations, and the defense and commitment with shared Western values.
“The relationship between Colombia and the United States will be one between two sovereign nations that always seek to advance their own interests,” Minister Bula said. “That is our approach, and we hope that this new era of bilateral relations will be as beneficial as possible for both peoples.”
According to the Colombian magazine Semana, the encounter between Sec. Rubio and President de la Espriella is scheduled for the afternoon. According to the magazine, Rubio and de la Espriella are expected to sign civil nuclear energy and critical mineral agreements after the meeting. The Secretary of State is also expected to hold an encounter with the staff at the U.S. embassy in Bogotá.
Colombia and the United States have maintained friendly relations for over 200 years — however, the friendly ties were severely and unilaterally strained over the past years due to the actions of de la Espriella’s predecessor, former Marxist President Gustavo Petro. Petro maintained a notoriously antagonistic stance with the United States that notably escalated following the start of President Donald Trump’s second term in 2025.
Petro’s hostile stance against Trump mainly centered on Trump’s policies against illegal migration and the fight against narco-terrorism in the region. Most notably, Petro called upon Americans to “get rid of Trump” during a controversial October 2025 interview with Univision and called for the U.S. military to disobey President Donald Trump as commander-in-chief. In November, Petro dared Sec. Rubio to “arrest him” after the Trump administration sanctioned Petro for failing to properly address drug trafficking in Colombia.
In contrast, President de la Espriella, a conservative lawyer and politician, publicly vowed to restore Colombia’s friendly ties with the United States and restore normal diplomatic relations should he become president. During the opening days of his four-year administration, President de la Espriella officially brought Colombia into the U.S.-led Americas Counter Cartel Coalition (A3C), also known as the “Shield of the Americas.”
The Colombian Defense Ministry also signed an agreement with the U.S. Department of War opening the possibility for joint Colombia-U.S. strikes against narco-terrorist groups operating in Colombian territory.
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