Gustavo Petro suggested legalizing cocaine during US Secretary of Homeland Security’s visit

The meeting between Gustavo Petro and Kristi Noem, Donald Trump’s Secretary of Homeland Security, included some tense moments. There was no chemistry between them, and it was especially noticeable in Noem’s face, as she displayed her discomfort. The Colombian president, known for speaking his mind, told the ultraconservative Republican official, face-to-face, that one of the solutions to combat drug trafficking would be to legalize cocaine, as was the case in the past with alcohol. This wasn’t the first time Petro has made the suggestion, and as the end of his administration approaches in 16 months, he has fewer and fewer qualms about expressing his true opinions.

Noem’s face, when Petro’s words were translated, was one of astonishment. Unaccustomed to such frank speech, she misinterpreted some of the president’s comments and even stated, in an interview with a U.S. television network, that he had claimed to be friends with members of Tren de Aragua, the Venezuelan criminal gang. But that turned out to be false, as Petro, Foreign Minister Laura Sarabia, and Defense Minister Pedro Sánchez have all stated. It was Sánchez himself who revealed Petro’s comments Monday about the need to legalize cocaine, as part of a speech in which he described the war on drugs that Washington has waged since the era of Richard Nixon as a failure.

“The president did not claim to have ties to Tren de Aragua. He reflected on its origins and the expansion of this criminal organization in different regional contexts. As Minister of Defense, I clarified at the meeting that while the U.S. has designated Tren de Aragua as a terrorist organization, in Colombia it is classified as a Common Organized Crime Group (COCG), given its criminal capacity and not its criminal methods,” the minister explained on social media. He also announced that 106 members of the gang have been arrested in Colombia, including four of its leaders, and that another 134 have been identified, 15 of whom are wanted by Interpol.

The controversy generated by the visit of Trump’s envoy has left a bitter taste in the mouth of Colombian diplomacy. On the day of the meeting, everything seemed to have gone more or less well, as Noem and Sarabia made clear in a joint public statement, but the Republican was highly critical of Petro afterward, which is hardly surprising. Trump had already squared up to the Colombian president when they argued about the humiliating manner in which Colombians were deported from the U.S., and that chorus of insults was joined by MAGA influencers and even Secretary of State of Marco Rubio. Petro took up the gauntlet, comparing the White House tenant’s policies to those of Nazi Germany.

Sign up for our weekly newsletter to get more English-language news coverage from EL PAÍS USA Edition