| June 24, 2026 | By Katrin Bennhold |
Good morning, world. President Trump has made a muscular pivot to the Western Hemisphere. He sent special forces to capture the Venezuelan president. He deployed a fleet of warships in waters close to Cuba. He has aggressively supported right-wing populist candidates across the region, with some success.
Today my colleague Annie Correal, a Latin America correspondent currently based in Bogotá, writes about Trump’s biggest prize to date: Colombia, where his favored candidate just ousted one of the few remaining left-leaning governments in the region.
(P.S. As a proud resident of Wales, I can’t help but encourage you to read today’s Around the World item. Spoiler alert: Yes, everyone does know everyone else.)
Also:
| Dangerous heat in EuropeU.S. and Iran conflicting accountsRonaldo’s World Cup record |
The right-wing victory in Colombia is Trump’s victory, too
By Annie Correal
On Sunday night, Abelardo De La Espriella, a 47-year-old lawyer who calls himself “The Tiger,” appeared before a crowd in Barranquilla, on the Caribbean Coast of Colombia. He introduced himself from behind bulletproof glass as the country’s new president. Fireworks lit the sky.
De La Espriella’s supporters weren’t the only ones celebrating. Roughly 3,000 kilometers north, some in the White House were exuberant, too. “He Won, BIG!” Trump wrote on social media. Secretary of State Marco Rubio called De La Espriella to congratulate him and said the administration was looking forward to working together.
De La Espriella’s apparent win — the voting appears to be very close, with a customary review of votes still continuing — would signify the end of Colombia’s first left-wing government, under President Gustavo Petro. It adds another right-wing populist leader to a growing roster in the region. It’s a victory for Trump, who has been throwing his weight behind right-wing leaders in Latin America from Honduras to Argentina as he seeks to rid the region of leftist influence.
But the push isn’t just about ideology.
Trump has said he wants to use U.S. military force to “eradicate” cartels and gangs across Latin America. Doing so requires allies who are willing to enter into contentious agreements that allow the U.S. military to conduct joint operations in their territory. That hasn’t been an easy sell, and so far, only a few countries have officially gotten on board.
In Colombia, as one Latin America analyst put it to me recently, Trump has secured his biggest trophy to date.
‘Retribution’
The Trump administration’s first choice for conducting these sorts of operations would most likely be Mexico, which Trump has long blamed for flooding America with fentanyl. But leaders in Mexico have been adamant that they will not allow the U.S. to strike cartels within its borders.
In some ways, Colombia is almost as important.
It supplies about two-thirds of the world’s cocaine and its armed groups are known to partner with those in Mexico. Several powerful Colombian trafficking groups have already been designated as terrorist organizations by the U.S.
U.S. officials do not necessarily think that they can stop the flow of drugs by targeting these groups and their leaders, experts have told me. Decades of anti-narcotics efforts in Latin America have shown that if one cartel head is taken out, another soon steps in as a replacement.
Instead, experts say, Trump’s new military push is part effort to exercise greater control over the region, and part spectacle for his base — an attempt to show that Trump is hitting back against the powerful criminal groups he has blamed for causing mayhem at home.
This month, the U.S. killed a leader of the Tren de Aragua gang in Venezuela in a joint operation with Venezuelan forces. Trump celebrated it as a major victory. He posted a video on Truth Social of a building exploding and invoked the names of crime victims in Georgia and Texas, calling the operation “retribution.”
The Shield of the Americas
That is the kind of thing we could expect to see in Colombia with a willing right-wing ally like De La Espriella in charge, experts say.
De La Espriella’s pledge to crush his country’s armed groups is part of what got him elected. Many Colombians are fed up with their country’s decades-long, drug-fueled armed conflict, which has recently seen a resurgence of violence under the leftist President Petro.
Unlike Petro, De La Espriella has applauded the U.S. military strikes on suspected drug boats, which have killed over 200 people off South America’s coast, and has said he’d engage in similar operations in Colombian waters. He has also said he’s eager to enroll Colombia in Trump’s regional security coalition, the Shield of the Americas.
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| De La Espriella’s supporters in Barranquilla, Colombia, on Sunday. Federico Rios for The New York Times |
Around 20 countries in Latin America and the Caribbean have enrolled in the coalition to date. So far, only Ecuador and Guatemala have signed on to do joint operations with the U.S.; other countries have resisted formal agreements, fearing pushback from citizens, after a long history of bloody U.S. interventions in the region.
De La Espriella, who ran on a nationalist platform, has said he has a similar red line. But experts say there is little doubt he will allow Trump to do what he wants, including conducting operations in one of Latin America’s largest countries.
His victory means that Brazil and Mexico — the region’s first and second largest countries — are now the only significant left-leaning holdouts.
Brazil has an upcoming election in the fall; Trump has already met at the White House with the right-wing contender, the son of the jailed former leader Jair Bolsonaro. I expect we will be hearing more from Trump on that race before long.
Related: Trump said that Venezuela “has become a happy country.” Its people disagree and anger has mounted.
Join the conversation: Share your comments here.
| MORE TOP NEWS |
A dangerous heat wave in Europe
France recorded its hottest day ever yesterday and reported at least 40 deaths from drowning. Most of the victims were young people seeking a reprieve in unsupervised lakes and canals.
The most intense conditions are forecast across swaths of Britain, France and Spain, where temperatures could reach or exceed 40 degrees Celsius. Andorra, Austria, Belgium, Germany, Luxembourg, Slovenia and Switzerland are also under top-level heat warnings.
The searing temperatures are drawing comparisons to 2003, when a deadly heat wave caused 70,000 deaths and set off a European reckoning. This week will test the continent’s response.
| OTHER NEWS |
| The U.S. and Iran offered conflicting accounts of whether Tehran had agreed to nuclear inspections.Traffic through the Strait of Hormuz is rebounding: 109 vessels passed through over the past three days, the largest number since the war started.Israeli soldiers fatally shot two people in southern Lebanon, renewing fears of a flare-up.A court in Iran sentenced Parastoo Ahmadi, an outspoken female singer, to 74 lashes for performing without a hijab.Allies of Mayor Zohran Mamdani won competitive Democratic House primary races in New York, showing the strength of his progressive coalition.Buffeted by global turmoil and an ascendant populist far-right party at home, Prime Minister Anthony Albanese of Australia is trying to keep his country feeling hopeful.The husband of Nicola Sturgeon, Scotland’s former leader, was sentenced to five years in prison for buying a bizarre range of items with party funds. |
| The U.S. warned that the Rapid Support Forces in Sudan are massing near the city of El Obeid and that “mass atrocities” could occur if the city falls.Times exclusive: Mark Zuckerberg directed Meta to create a prediction markets app known internally as Arena.Symptoms in the Ebola outbreak in Africa are milder, which is good news for patients but could make it harder to control. Our global health reporter Apoorva Mandavilli explains in this video. |
TOP OF THE WORLD
The most clicked link in your newsletter yesterday was about newly discovered compositions by Mozart.
| WORLD CUP |
Record-breaking Ronaldo
Cristiano Ronaldo made World Cup history by becoming the first player to score in six tournaments. He scored twice on Tuesday as Portugal thrashed Uzbekistan, 5-0.
Wasted chances: England was frustrated by Ghana in a surprise goal-less draw.
Locker room note: After Iran’s match against Belgium, the team left a message for fans and the city of Los Angeles. And the United States eased travel restrictions on the Iranian team, allowing them into the country two days before a pivotal match against Egypt.
| SUPERCOMPUTER OF THE DAY |
LineShine
This supercomputer in Shenzhen, China, was declared the world’s fastest by a group of researchers yesterday. LineShine outperformed El Capitan, an American computing system that had held the top prize since 2024. In addition to its raw speed, the system stood out for using only standard microprocessors and not the special-purpose chips that most high-end supercomputers rely on for heavy number crunching.
| MORNING READ |
Every villain prompts a hunt for an origin story — a quest to try to comprehend the incomprehensible. To understand Jeffrey Epstein, my colleagues looked at clues from his youth.
The picture that emerges from the Epstein files and from nearly two dozen interviews contains the fuzzy outlines of his future self: From a young age, Epstein preferred the protective company of a tight group of brainy boys to the popularity contests of adolescence. People who knew him as a child struggle to square the sexual predator with the boy they knew. Read more about Epstein’s boyhood.
| AROUND THE WORLD |
Does everyone know everyone in Wales?
Elis James is a Welsh comedian and radio host who believes he has a friend in common with just about everyone in his home country of 3.2 million.
James takes calls from random listeners on his radio show. Then he will ask for details like the age of the callers and the schools they attended. He’s able to name a mutual friend about half the time. Read more about James’s many connections.
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| RECIPE |
Wang mandu translates to “king dumplings,” a reference to their size, rather than any royal status. A fluffy sweet bun is the perfect parcel for the savory beef, mushroom and onion filling, which is not traditionally Korean but tastes familiar, like a good burger.
