US President Donald Trump once again addressed his Colombian counterpart, Gustavo Petro, from the White House on Wednesday, October 22, asserting that"he's a thug and a bad guy. He's a guy who produces a lot of drugs," amid the diplomatic crisis the government is experiencing with Washington."We reached an agreement with him, but no, he's a thug and a bad guy and he's hurt his country a lot," the US president said from the White House, without giving further details of the alleged understanding."He's a thug and a bad guy": Donald Trump lashed out at Gustavo Petro and announced cuts to Colombia. He also warned that he could take"very severe measures" against the country. https://t.co/if1kX8qDUN
— Semana Magazine (@RevistaSemana)October 22, 2025
Trump then harshly criticized the country's anti-drug policy."You're doing very badly, Colombia. You produce cocaine. You have cocaine factories. You grow all kinds of junk, bad drugs, that enter the United States, usually through Mexico."
Finally, he warned President Petro:"He better be careful or we will take very severe measures against him and his country. Your country is, and what you have led your country to, is a death trap," the US president concluded after being questioned by journalists in the chamber about President Petro's positions.
Petro's feeling: "It has me on the verge of being judged."
President Petro made a surprising statement that caught the attention of his closest team members. This came amid a serious diplomatic crisis with his counterpart, Donald Trump.
Petro directly expressed that he has a feeling about the measures that the U.S. judicial authorities might take against him.
In this regard, the head of state stated that he is on the verge of being tried by Trump for"drug trafficking."
"That's why I want to link the history of the debates because I myself had disconnected them in my mind and had forgotten them, but now I have to remember the common thread that brought me to this palace and that has me on the verge of being tried as a drug trafficker by Mr. Trump and his judges, who I believe are independent of him," noted the Colombian president.
Petro's premonition comes amid what is arguably the worst diplomatic crisis Colombia has experienced with the United States in its more than 200 years of bilateral relations.
Even recently, US President Donald Trump called him a"drug trafficking leader," a dig that came after Gustavo Petro demonstrated his closeness to the aforementioned Nicolás Maduro regime, despite the US military operations deployed in the Caribbean Sea against drug boats. However, the Colombian president, far from toning down his language toward Donald Trump, sharpened it. This week, for example, he accused Trump and US Congressman Bernie Moreno of being behind a coup d'état in Colombia.
And if that were not enough, Petro, in another message that he published on his personal X account, announced that the Free Trade Agreement (FTA) with the United States was “de facto suspended,” unilaterally by the Trump administration.
“The FTA is suspended de facto and by unilateral decision of the US government. By imposing 10% tariffs, the FTA treaty has already been violated and the old tariff preferences that kept Colombia under US control have been nullified. They were unilaterally broken by the US, not by us, and they leave us free. Let us not be afraid of being free; we have the whole world ahead of us. Let us work to explore it, understand it, and seduce it,” the Colombian president stated on his X account.
The FTA is suspended de facto and by unilateral decision of the US government. By imposing 10% tariffs, the FTA treaty has already been violated and the old tariff preferences that kept Colombia under US control have become null and void. They are broken… https://t.co/hueByoUDiL
— Gustavo Petro (@petrogustavo) October 20, 2025
He also made it clear: “Colombians know how to do it. As Trump says, we're out of control, it's true. The only real control over a democracy isn't exercised by foreigners who hate migrants and hate Latin Americans; it's exercised by the people themselves. Trump doesn't control Colombia; he only obeys the Colombian and Latin American people, if he wants to.”
"I will respond intelligently. We have maintained the surviving clauses of the FTA because we felt like it, but the Ministry of Commerce has the decrees that I have yet to sign, with a Colombian position in defense of national labor and the life of humanity," Gustavo Petro finally insisted, revealing the trade crisis that also exists under the Trump administration.
