Bogotá, Colombia – Hard-right firebrand Abelardo de la Espriella won a shock victory in the first round of Colombia’s presidential election on Sunday and will face a runoff with leftist Ivan Cepeda in June.
The most recent voter intention polls predicted Cepeda would beat de la Espriella in the first round by an average margin of eight points.
With over 99% of the vote, de la Espriella leads Cepeda by almost 3 percentage points (43.7% to 40.9%).
Because no candidate received more than 50% of the vote, a runoff election will be held on June 21.
Read more: Colombian Election 2026 Candidate Guide: Abelardo de la Espriella
The vote closely followed the political divisions seen in previous elections, including the 2022 election in which Gustavo Petro was elected president and the 2016 referendum on a peace deal with FARC rebels. Voters in rural areas affected by Colombia’s armed conflict voted for Cepeda, while voters in the center of the country (excluding the capital Bogota) voted for de la Espriella’s Defensores de la Patria ticket.
Paloma Valencia, a right-wing senator backed by former President Álvaro Uribe, was considered as a favorite to advance to the second round alongside Cepeda as recently as early May, but her campaign faltered in the final weeks and ended with less than 7% of the vote.
Yann Basset, a political scientist at the University of Rosario in Bogota, said: Latin America Report He hopes Valencia’s supporters will rally around de la Espriella and give him victory in the runoff within three weeks.
De la Espriella, who skillfully ran an artificial intelligence (AI)-enhanced social media campaign, promised to “defeat the tyranny of the left.”
His proposals include building 10 large prisons, like El Salvador’s dictator Nayib Bukele, and militarizing the entire territory to fight illegal armed groups.
Read more: Colombian Elections 2026 Candidate Guide: Iván Cepeda
Cepeda continued the Petro’s historic agreement for Colombia, including ongoing efforts to achieve “complete peace” with many armed groups and reduce inequality gaps in society.
“Colombia can and must be a just country, a country where each citizen and every community has effective access to the rights, property and services essential for a fulfilling life,” Cepeda said on the eve of the election.
On Sunday night, Petro said he would not accept the results of the preliminary tally, and at a campaign event at Bogotá’s Tequendama hotel, defiant Cepeda supporters were heard chanting “No Pasarán!” (“They won’t pass!”), referring to right-wing rivals.
Featured image: Abelardo de la Espriella attends a campaign rally in Nariño, Colombia, April 2026.
Image source: Abelardo de la Espriella from X
