The United States and Colombia withdrew from their trade war on Sunday after hours of heated exchanges between the leaders in public.
The United States threatened tariffs and sanctions against Bogotá after Colombia refused to accept two U.S. military planes carrying deported Colombian citizens. The United States is Colombia’s largest trading partner.
U.S. President Donald Trump and Colombian President Gustavo Petro traded barbs online late Sunday, with Colombia eventually agreeing to accept the deportees and the United States claiming victory. Here’s more about what happened and what danger looms for Washington and Bogotá.
What was the conflict between Trump and Colombia about?
Amid President Trump’s intensifying crackdown on U.S. immigration, Colombia’s President Petro Colombia has refused to allow two U.S. military planes carrying deported Colombian immigrants to land.
He accused Trump of not treating deported immigrants with dignity and respect. Petro reposted a video from X showing deportees being restrained by their hands and feet at a Brazilian airport. “I cannot allow immigrants to stay in a country that doesn’t want them. But if the country sends them back, it must do so with dignity and respect for them and our country,” he wrote.
A report from the U.S. Department of Homeland Security estimates that there will be 240,000 illegal immigrants in the United States in 2022.
Petro offered to send a presidential plane to facilitate the return of migrants, which he argued was more dignified than having the United States turn them away.
Trump fired back, accusing Petro of threatening American security.
Threatening tariffs and sanctions, Trump wrote on his Truth social platforms on Sunday: “These measures are just the beginning. “We will not allow the Colombian government to violate its legal obligations regarding the reception and repatriation of criminals forced into the United States!”
U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio also said Sunday that he had approved visa restrictions for Colombian officials and their families “responsible for disrupting U.S. repatriation flight operations.”
What was Trump’s tariff threat?
As the back-and-forth continued, Trump stepped up his threats, ordering a 25% tariff on all Colombian goods entering the United States. He warned that these tariffs would rise to 50% next week.
President Trump also announced that he would impose “visa sanctions” and “travel bans and immediate visa cancellation” on government officials, their families and supporters, while strengthening border checks for all Colombian nationals and cargo.
What was Colombia’s reaction?
In retaliation for Trump’s threats, Petro threatened to impose a 25% tariff on American products.
Colombia’s president posted a series of defiant messages on Sunday responding to Trump’s threats.
“Your blockade does not scare me. “Because Colombia is not only a country of beauty, but also the heart of the world,” he wrote in one of them.
“The United States cannot treat Colombian immigrants like criminals,” Petro wrote in
The row was resolved late Sunday. Colombian Foreign Minister Luis Gilberto Murillo told a news conference that “authorities have overcome the deadlock” and will accept citizens expelled from the United States. “The Colombian government has prepared the presidential plane to facilitate the return of Colombians scheduled to arrive in Colombia on deportation flights this morning,” he added.
Colombia’s statement also said Murillo and Colombia’s ambassador to the United States would visit Washington in the coming days to continue diplomatic talks and ease tensions.
The White House also said in a statement that it agreed to all of President Trump’s conditions, including that “Colombia will accept indefinitely all illegal aliens returned from the United States, including on U.S. military aircraft, without restriction or delay.”
What does the United States import from Colombia?
If a tariff war had proceeded, both sides would have suffered.
From January to November 2024, the United States imported $16 billion worth of goods from Colombia, according to U.S. Census data.
The United States sources most of its cut flowers from Colombia, nearly two-thirds, or 66%, according to 2022 data from the Observatory of Economic Complexity (OEC). Americans would have suffered more if tariffs were imposed on Valentine’s Day, which falls on February 14th.
The United States also sources more than 20 percent of its coffee imports from Colombia, falling behind Brazil, the largest supplier of coffee to the United States.
The United States also imports crude oil, gold, aluminum structures, bananas, coffee, and tea extracts from Colombia, but in much smaller quantities.
Colombia is one of a rare group of countries that has a trade deficit with the United States. In other words, the United States exports more to Colombia than it imports from the South American country.
How will the trade war with the United States affect Colombia?
While the trade war may have made certain goods, such as flowers or coffee, more expensive for U.S. consumers, it would have had a bigger impact on the Colombian economy, affecting both exports and imports.
“These measures will have significant political and economic implications,” Victor Munoz, a visiting fellow at the European Council on Foreign Relations, a German-based think tank, told Al Jazeera.
“For Colombia, these measures could lead to the loss of thousands of jobs, especially in sectors such as oil and gas, gold, coffee and flowers,” he explained.
According to 2022 OEC data, the United States is Colombia’s largest trading partner in terms of imports and exports. A quarter of Colombia’s exports are destined for the United States, and imports from the United States account for 26.4% of Colombia’s total imports.
“Colombia has worked for decades to expand commercial partnerships and diversify its international relationships. However, it is unrealistic in the short term to expect Colombia to immediately replace the country as an export destination for goods and services or the volume of U.S. investments,” Munoz said.
Colombia imported $17 billion worth of goods from the United States from January to November 2024, according to the U.S. Census.
The United States will send approximately $2.5 billion worth of oil products to Colombia in 2023, making petroleum products the most valuable U.S. export to Colombia. The next most valuable export was corn, worth $1.2 billion in 2023, and chemicals, worth $1 billion in the same year.
Colombia also imports soybean meal and airplanes from the United States.
“Tariffs could trigger a devaluation of the Colombian peso, increasing economic risks and putting inflationary pressures through higher prices of imported goods and raw materials,” Munoz said.
“These measures will undoubtedly have significant economic and social impacts on affected countries such as Colombia.”
What are deportation flights and are they new?
Deportation flights are flights that send unauthorized immigrants to their country of origin. However, according to an anonymous US official, this is the first time US military aircraft have been used to deport migrants, AFP reported.
Deportations are not new, and the U.S. began deporting immigrants in 1892, when it deported 2,801 immigrants, according to the Department of Homeland Security. However, the number has rapidly increased since the 1990s.
When Democratic President Joe Biden took office in 2021, he promised to halt deportations but expanded them, recently expelling the largest number of immigrants in nearly a decade. Last fiscal year, there were more than 271,000.
According to the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) website, the United States deported 28,635 Colombian citizens from 2021 to 2024. Nearly half of these occurred in fiscal year 2024.
But Trump contested the 2024 election by accusing the Biden administration of allowing “hordes” of undocumented immigrants to enter the country and making baseless claims that countries were sending violent criminals to the United States.
He promised to carry out “the largest deportation operation in history.”
Meanwhile, President Trump also made clear his intention to use tariffs as a weapon. He has threatened strict tariffs against countries including China, Mexico and Canada.
