Colombia’s President Refutes Rumors He Wrote Anti-Trump Rant While He Was Drunk

(Breitbart )Far-left President of Colombia Gustavo Petro on Monday refuted claims that he was in a state of inebriation when he published a late-night social media message that caused a short-lived diplomatic crisis with the United States on Sunday.

In an extensive rant, Petro accused President Donald Trump of racism for his plan to curtail illegal immigration, but not without asking him to share a glass of whisky to discuss the dangers of fossil fuels. Trump famously abstains from consuming alcohol.

“How much has our press degraded to believe that dignity is drunkenness? The cipayos [pejorative term used in South America to describe someone at the service of “foreign interests”] are the expression of a mental degradation, to let thought be colonized is worse than the physical colonization of a foreign power over the territory,” Petro wrote on Twitter.

“It is easy to write as a comfortable resident from Miami and not as the black workers of Miami,” he continued.

Petro’s message is a direct response to Colombian journalist Luis Carlos Vélez, who resides in Miami. On Monday, Vélez publicly asked outgoing Foreign Minister Luis Murillo and his upcoming successor Laura Sarabia, “in the most respectful way,” where and under what conditions Petro was when he started feuding with the United States.

The Colombian president issued the comments after local journalists and politicians questioned Petro’s sobriety at the time he posted the roughly 3:41 a.m. (local time) tweet that sparked the diplomatic crisis with the United States.

Petro, a former member of the Marxist M19 terrorist guerrilla and Colombia’s first leftist president in the nation’s history, is known for single-handedly plunging Colombia into diplomatic problems with historically friendly nations such as Israel.

On Sunday, Petro caused a hours-long diplomatic crisis with the United States after he abruptly refused to accept a U.S. deportation flight of Colombians scheduled to arrive later that day. Petro justified his decision in a late-night post on the grounds that the United States treats “Colombian migrants as criminals.”

Minutes before refusing the arrival of the plane with deportees, Petro, in a now-deleted post, stated that the deportees were to be welcomed “with flags and flowers.” Petro deleted the post and, roughly 30 minutes later, published the message where he refused to allow the plane to land in Colombia.

President Donald Trump responded to Petro’s actions with a barrage of retaliatory measures, including a 25-percent tariff and visa sanctions on Colombian government officials. Petro replied in a long, incoherent Twitter rant.

Petro ultimately caved hours after his rant and “agreed to all” of President Trump’s terms. A Colombian delegation led by outgoing Foreign Minister Luis Murillo is set to travel to Washington, DC, at a later date to resolve the Petro-caused diplomatic crisis.

In an official event on Monday, Petro expressed his displeasure at the media coverage of his administration and mentioned the controversial tweet that caused the diplomatic crisis with the United States. Petro justified his prolific use of Twitter claiming that the media does nothing but talk “bullshit” about him.

“They say, why do I tweet so much? Because television does nothing but talk bullshit and lie about me. So I have to express myself,” Petro said. “The tweet I posted on the subject of Colombian deportees has 33 million people who have read it. I am doing better than if they translate me through people who sometimes do not even understand the words I say.”

Local politicians have also demanded answers on where, exactly, Petro was when he published that message.

In an interview on Monday, the head of the Colombian Senate, Efraín Cepeda, publicly questioned if Petro was in Bogotá “analyzing what happened with his advisors” on Sunday at the time of the incident, as the government claimed.

“The only thing we do know is that he was not in Bogotá yesterday while the country was burning down, nor was he in the capital analyzing what happened with his advisors,” Senator Cepeda said, clarifying that Petro has not explained himself to the Senate.

Daniel García-Peña, the Colombian ambassador to Washington, confirmed to local radio on Monday that Petro was not present in the Casa de Nariño presidential palace as the crisis unfolded nor was he present in the Sunday emergency staff meeting that sought to find a solution to the impasse.

The Colombian newspaper El Espectador reported on Monday that it asked the Casa de Nariño about Petro’s whereabouts at the time, to which the Colombian Presidential Palace responded that it had “no information on the matter.” García-Peña claimed that Petro was nevertheless “supervising” the dialogues.

In a separate interview with Caracol Radio, García-Peña claimed that Petro did not consult anyone before posting the message.

“The truth is that the tweets that Petro initially sent went out without consultation, but we were very emphatic in insisting to the president on the implications of the tweets and that is why, I repeat, that we celebrate that later yesterday the number of tweets decreased,” García-Peña said.

In recent years, Gustavo Petro has attracted recurring but unconfirmed speculation around his relationship with alcohol in public. In 2022, during his presidential campaign, Petro himself apologized for allegedly failing to properly “digest” alcohol after some travel, leading to the then-candidate delivering an incoherent ramble about turning Colombia “red” through communist ideology.

Months later, Conservative Senator María Fernanda Cabal accused Petro of being “drunk” during his June 19, 2022, victory speech after he was elected president.

“Overall, I didn’t like it at all. It was obvious that [Gustavo Petro] was intoxicated. I think he needs to keep up appearances. That’s how he has come out in other speeches,” Cabal told local media at the time.

Christian K. Caruzo is a Venezuelan writer and documents life under socialism. You can follow him on Twitter here.