Colombia refused to accept U.S. military planes deporting immigrants, setting off a furious reaction from President Trump, who on Sunday announced a barrage of tariffs and sanctions targeting the country, which has long been a top U.S. ally in Latin America.
The United States will immediately impose a 25 percent tariff on all Colombian imports, and will raise them to 50 percent in one week, Mr. Trump said on social media.
The Trump administration will also “fully impose” banking and financial sanctions against Colombia, and will apply a travel ban and revoke visas of Colombian government officials, the president said.
The move reflects how Mr. Trump is making an example out of Colombia as countries around the world are grappling with how to prepare for the mass deportations of unauthorized immigrants that he has promised.
“This looks like a pretty bold and daring escalation on both sides,” said Will Freeman, a fellow for Latin America studies at the Council on Foreign Relations, citing Colombia’s economic reliance on the United States, which is still the South American country’s largest trading partner even as China has been making inroads.
“But equally, for Trump to threaten Colombia this way is pretty bold itself,” Mr. Freeman added. “That’s because Colombia remains historically the longest standing, the deepest, strategic ally in the region.”
Colombia’s president, Gustavo Petro, said earlier Sunday in a series of social media posts that Colombia would not accept military deportation flights from the United States until the Trump administration provided a process to treat Colombian migrants with “dignity and respect.”
Mr. Petro also said that Colombia had already turned away military planes carrying Colombian deportees. While other countries in Latin America have raised concerns about Mr. Trump’s sweeping deportation plans, Colombia appears to be among the first to explicitly refuse to cooperate.
“I cannot make migrants stay in a country that does not want them,” Mr. Petro wrote, “but if that country sends them back, it should be with dignity and respect for them and for our country.” He said he was still open to receiving deportees on nonmilitary flights.
“Colombian President Petro had authorized flights and provided all needed authorizations and then canceled his authorization when the planes were in the air,” Secretary of State Marco Rubio said in a statement.
A representative for Mr. Petro confirmed that the planes had been turned away, but did not immediately respond to other questions. Representatives for Colombia’s Foreign Ministry did not immediately respond to requests for comment.
President Petro’s remarks came in response to a post about the treatment of Brazilian deportees. Brazil’s foreign ministry complained of “degrading treatment” of its citizens after 88 migrants arrived in the country handcuffed on Friday and some complained of mistreatment after not being given water or allowed to use the bathroom during the flight.
Mr. Petro’s stance put him on a collision course with Mr. Trump, who since taking office last Monday has issued a series of executive orders and made other moves aimed at laying the groundwork to try to deport an enormous number of migrants.
In his missives on social media, Mr. Trump called Mr. Petro, a former left-wing guerrilla, a “socialist,” a term which Mr. Petro has no problem in using to describe himself, and contended that Mr. Petro was “very unpopular.” Mr. Petro’s approval ratings stand at around 34 percent, weighed down by corruption scandals and a resurgence in fighting among armed groups.
To justify his measures targeting Colombia, Mr. Trump also claimed that the military deportation flights refused by Mr. Petro included a “large number of Illegal Criminals” and that the United States was seeking the “return of the Criminals they forced into the United States.”
The tariffs alone could deal a significant blow to Colombia’s economy. The United States is Colombia’s largest trading partner, with top Colombian exports to the American market including crude oil, coffee and cut flowers.
Mr. Petro also cast attention on Americans living in Colombia. In a social media post, Mr. Petro said that more than 15,000 Americans were living in the country without authorization, and called upon them to “regularize” their immigration status.
The U.S. Embassy in Bogotá did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Mr. Petro did not include details about when or how many military planes and migrants had been turned away.
There were 190,000 unauthorized Colombian immigrants living in the U.S. in 2022, according to the most recent data available from the Pew Research Center.
Colombia has traditionally been a close U.S. ally, though differences have recently emerged regarding counternarcotics policies. While Mr. Petro has criticized the United States more than past presidents, he continued to collaborate with the United States and regularly accepted deportation flights, said Colombian political analyst Sergio Guzmán.
This is what “makes this new approach so surprising,” he added.
The United States typically sends back deportees in planes resembling commercial jets that are operated by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, or ICE.
After Mr. Trump signed an executive order to allow the military to assist in securing the border, the acting secretary of defense, Robert G. Salesses, said in a statement last week that the military would provide airplanes to support with deportation flights.
The Trump administration is sending the military planes in addition to the usual flights operated by ICE, meaning that they do not replace the typical flights that land several times a week in countries throughout the region, and which Mr. Petro referred to as “civilian flights.”
The new planes sent by the military can only depart from the United States if the receiving nation has approved them. Mr. Salesses said that before the military sent flights, the State Department would first “obtain the requisite diplomatic clearances and provide host-nation notification.” He said the flights would transport people in U.S. Border Patrol custody.
It is unclear which countries may have agreed to receive military planes carrying deportees, or if Colombia had agreed — and then revoked its agreement.
Early on Friday, Guatemala received two U.S. Air Force jets carrying around 160 deportees in total, making it one of the first countries to publicly receive such flights. The Guatemalan government sent the country’s vice president to oversee the arrival of the deportees on the C-17 aircraft and the Trump administration hailed that effort in messages on social media.
Officials in Mexico, the source of the largest number of unauthorized immigrants in the United States, have said they remained open to receiving deported citizens and routine deportations have taken place to Mexican cities along the U.S. border in recent days.
“When it comes to repatriations, we will always welcome Mexican men and women back to our territory with open arms,” Mexico’s Foreign Affairs Ministry said in a statement on social media on Friday night.
Still, Mexican authorities have not disclosed whether they plan to accept military flights or whether they will receive deported migrants from other countries, as Mexico has sometimes done in the past.
On Friday, NBC reported that Mexico had refused to authorize a military plane carrying deportees from the United States, an account that could not be independently confirmed.
Honduras, which like Colombia has pushed back against the Trump administration’s plans for mass deportations, has said it is open to receiving military flights.
The Honduran foreign minister, Enrique Reina, said in an interview on Saturday that his government was “open to receiving our compatriots as long as the conditions are appropriate and have been properly coordinated.”
He said that the government had been in conversation with the U.S. Embassy in Honduras about deportation flights but it had not formally been asked to authorize the arrival of military planes carrying deportees.
Jack Nicas contributed reporting from Rio de Janeiro.
