Bogotá.- U.S. Senators Bernie Moreno and Rubén Gallego, visiting Colombia, met this Thursday with five presidential pre-candidates from the Andean country to analyze the bilateral relationship and the Colombian political landscape in the run-up to next year’s elections, according to those present.
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“In Cartagena (…) we held a constructive dialogue on Colombia’s major challenges in security, the fight against drug trafficking, poverty and migration, and on how to strengthen cooperation with the United States”, stated journalist Vicky Dávila on her X account, who will seek the Presidency as leader of the right-wing Movimiento Valientes. Also attending this meeting were María Fernanda Cabal, from the right-wing Uribista party Centro Democrático; Claudia López, from the citizen movement Imparables; the independent Juan Daniel Oviedo, from the movement Con toda por Colombia, and Gustavo Bolívar, from the ruling Pacto Histórico and close to President Gustavo Petro. “I expressed the concerns we have in the country and the danger our democracy is in,” Cabal stated about the meeting with the American senators, both of Colombian origin. For her part, Claudia López, who was mayor of Bogotá, thanked Moreno and Gallego “for their appreciation and interest in Colombia” and highlighted that there are “common interests” between the two countries. Among those, he highlighted “respecting our institutions, citizens and their decisions; cooperating effectively to reduce poverty, inequality and crime and increase opportunities, development, work and legal exports; combating organized crime and the criminal dictatorship of (Nicolás) Maduro and achieving the return of freedom and democracy in Venezuela”. The meeting took place three days after the death of Senator and opposition presidential pre-candidate Miguel Uribe Turbay, of the Democratic Center, after two months in critical condition due to the gunshot wounds he suffered in the head during an attack perpetrated on June 7 in Bogotá. Uribe Turbay, whose funeral was attended yesterday by Moreno, McNamara and the U.S. Under Secretary of State, Christopher Landau, was beginning his electoral campaign events when he was the target of the attack. Colombia, which will hold legislative elections on March 8, 2026, and presidential elections on May 31, is experiencing a tense political climate due to the assassination of Uribe Turbay, the shooting in which Representative Julio César Triana, of the right-wing party Cambio Radical, was unharmed yesterday, and the accusations from the Government and the opposition regarding the extreme polarization of the political discourse from both sides.
