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Trump plans sanction Colombia for violating deportation push
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US President Donald Trump has said he will impose 25% tariffs and sanctions on Colombia after its president barred two US military planes carrying deported migrants from landing in the country.
Trump said the tariffs “on all goods” coming into the US from Colombia would be put in place “immediately”, and in one week the 25% tariffs would be raised to 50%.
Colombian President Gustavo Petro responded by saying he would impose retaliatory tariffs of 25% on the US.
Petro earlier on Sunday said he had denied entry to US military deportation flights. He said he would “receive our fellow citizens on civilian planes, without treating them like criminals” and migrants must be returned “with dignity and respect”.
US officials told the BBC’s US partner, CBS News, that two military planes from San Diego were due to land in Colombia on Sunday with migrant deportees, but those plans were scrapped due to complications.
In response, Trump announced “urgent and decisive retaliatory measures” in a post on TruthSocial. He said the US will impose a travel ban and “immediate visa revocations” on Colombian government officials, as well as its allies and supporters.
Trump also said there would be visa sanctions on supporters of the Colombian government, and enhanced Customs and Border Protection inspections “of all Colombian nationals and cargo on national security grounds”.
“These measures are just the beginning,” Trump added, saying his administration would not allow the Colombian government “to violate its legal obligations with regard to the acceptance and return of the criminals they forced into the United States”.
Petro responded on X by announcing his own tariffs and celebrating Colombia’s heritage and resilience.
“Your blockade does not scare me, because Colombia, besides being the country of beauty, is the heart of the world,” he said.
He also offered his presidential plane to facilitate the “decent return” of deportees from the US who had been set to arrive in the country.
Also on Sunday, Petro said more than 15,666 Americans were in Colombia illegally – a figure the BBC has not been able to independently verify.
Petro said that unlike the Trump administration, he would “never” be seen carrying out a raid to return illegal US migrants.
The US imports about 20% of its coffee – worth nearly $2bn (£1.6bn) – from Colombia, as well as other goods like bananas, crude oil, avocados and flowers.
Tariffs will make importing these goods more expensive which, if passed onto the consumer, could mean higher coffee prices rising.
Importers could shift to other sources to avoid this, which would in turn hit Colombian producers by reducing a key market.
The sanctions and travel bans on the Colombian government and its supporters, and the breakdown in diplomatic relations that signals, are also significant.
This is now not just a war of trade, but a war of words.
It is no secret that Petro does not like Trump – he has heavily criticised his policies on migration and the environment in the past. That just ratcheted up.
Petro said Trump would “wipe out the human species because of greed” and accused Trump of considering Colombians an “inferior race.” He went on to say that he is “stubborn” and that while Trump can try to “carry out a coup” with “economic strength and arrogance” he will, in short, fight back.
“From today on, Colombia is open to the entire world, with open arms,” he said.
While Trump is unlikely to take threats from Colombia, this is something that should worry a US president who wants to tackle migration.
Trump’s own pick for deputy secretary of state, Christopher Landau, has argued that “working with other countries to stop such migratory flows” must be a “global imperative of US foreign policy”.
Tens of thousands of migrants from around the world head north towards the US after landing in South America each year, travelling up through Colombia, usually facilitated by criminal gangs.
The latest developments will no doubt make it harder for Trump’s administration to work with Colombia to stop this.
The feud between the two nations comes as Trump’s administration has vowed to carry out “mass deportations”. The president signed multiple executive orders related to immigration on his first day in office.
Some of Trump’s executive orders were signed with the aim of expanding Immigration and Customs Enforcement’s (ICE) ability to arrest and detain unlawful migrants on US soil.
White House spokesperson Karoline Leavitt said that 538 arrests were conducted on Thursday alone.
For comparison, ICE detained more than 149,700 people in the 2024 fiscal year under the Biden administration, which equals an average of 409 a day.
Trump declared a national emergency at the Mexico border, ordered officials to deny the right to citizenship to the children of migrants in the US illegally or on temporary visas and re-implemented his “Remain in Mexico” policy from his first term.
On Saturday, US Vice President JD Vance told CBS’s Face the Nation that he supports “doing law enforcement against violent criminals”.
“Just because we were founded by immigrants doesn’t mean that 240 years later that we have to have the dumbest immigration policy in the world,” he told CBS’s Margaret Brennan.
Tom Homan, Trump’s “border tsar” told ABC News on Sunday that the military is currently at the US-Mexico border helping with departure flights on military planes and building infrastructure to secure the border.
“It’s sending a strong signal to the world: Our border is closed,” he said.
Trump campaigned on securing the southern border and reducing the number of undocumented immigrants who enter the US.
An Ecuadorian court has sentenced former President Lenin Moreno to five years in prison for accepting bribes linked to the construction of the country’s largest hydroelectric dam.
Moreno, who served as president from 2017 to 2021, was among 20 people convicted over corruption allegations surrounding the Coca Codo Sinclair hydroelectric project, which was built by Chinese company Sinohydro.
Prosecutors alleged that Sinohydro paid about $76 million in bribes, representing roughly four per cent of the project’s total cost.
Moreno, 73, denied the allegations and maintained that he never received money from the Chinese company.
Speaking after Friday’s ruling, the former president said he had never received “a single cent” from Sinohydro.
He also blamed the case on the administration of his former political ally and predecessor, Rafael Correa, whom he accused of seeking revenge after their political relationship deteriorated.
Moreno served as Correa’s vice-president between 2007 and 2013 before succeeding him as president. The two later fell out after Moreno moved away from Correa’s socialist policies and developed closer ties with the United States.
The court also sentenced Moreno’s wife and other relatives to nearly three years in prison for complicity in the corruption case.
Two former managers of the Coca Codo Sinclair power plant were also among those convicted.
Prosecutors had initially requested a six-and-a-half-year prison sentence for Moreno.
The former president has announced plans to appeal the judgment.
US President Donald Trump has signed an executive order renaming Lake Ontario as “Lake America” for official US federal use, in the latest escalation of his dispute with Canada.
Trump signed the order on Thursday at the White House, saying the change was effective immediately. The order directs the US Department of the Interior to update federal geographic records and naming systems.
Trump justified the move by accusing Canada of treating the United States unfairly in trade and defence. He said Canada had been “ripping us off” in trade and criticised Ottawa over its relationship with Washington.
However, the order does not require Canada or international organisations to adopt the new name. Lake Ontario is shared by the US state of New York and Canada’s province of Ontario, with more than half of its surface area lying in Canadian territory.
Ontario Premier Doug Ford dismissed the move, saying the lake would continue to be known as Lake Ontario by Canadians and much of the rest of the world.
The renaming comes amid a rapidly worsening US-Canada trade dispute. Washington recently imposed 50 per cent tariffs on about $20 billion worth of Canadian goods, while Canada responded with retaliatory tariffs of its own on hundreds of US products.
The latest move echoes Trump’s decision in January 2025 to rename the Gulf of Mexico as the “Gulf of America” for US federal purposes.
Trump also suggested that further geographic name changes could be considered, joking that after a gulf and a lake, the United States might eventually rename the Atlantic or Pacific Ocean.
Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney’s government had not immediately issued a formal response to the latest order.
The controversy has added another symbolic dimension to already strained relations between the two neighbouring countries, as both sides continue to impose tariffs and seek to protect their economies.
The United States Secret Service has confirmed that it is aware of a video broadcast by Iranian state media that appears to threaten the life of Barron Trump, the youngest son of US President Donald Trump.
The nearly three-minute video, aired by the state-run Islamic Republic of Iran Broadcasting (IRIB), opens with an English-language graphic asking: “Where to kill Barron Trump?!” It then displays stylised graphics identifying places where Barron is publicly known to spend time, including Trump Tower in New York.
The video ends with a narrator referring to people being “eagerly waiting to receive our $10 million reward.”
Secret Service spokesperson Nate Herring confirmed that the agency was investigating the video as a potential threat against one of its protectees.
“The US Secret Service is aware of the video and investigates anything that can be perceived as a threat toward our protectees,” Secret Service spokesperson Nate Herring told CNN in a statement. “Out of concern for operational security, we do not discuss matters of protective intelligence.”
The apparent targeting of Barron marks a new development in a broader pattern of threats directed at Trump and members of his family by hard-line Iranian media.
Iranian media outlets have previously published material threatening President Trump and his family, while first lady Melania Trump has also been the subject of threats. However, the video appears to be the first public instance in which Barron has been specifically singled out.
A federal law enforcement source told CNN that the video forms part of a wider campaign of material from Iran targeting Trump and his family. According to the source, some of the videos have included details about movements and suggestions for killing members of the president’s family.
The security response to such threats involves continuously changing and adjusting protective arrangements, based on information gathered by the Secret Service, other US agencies, police authorities and foreign governments.
IRIB, which broadcast the video, is regarded as aligned with hard-liners within Iran’s regime, while its head is directly appointed by Iran’s supreme leader.
Trump has previously spoken publicly about threats against his life from Iran.
“I’m on whatever list… so far, I guess I’ve been a bit lucky, but maybe that doesn’t last very long. These are evil, sick people.”
He made the comments in July at the NATO summit in Turkey, before secretly leaving the country aboard an alternate military aircraft.
The departure was part of an elaborate security operation reportedly triggered by an Iranian threat. Trump boarded the aircraft while concealed inside a catering truck after officials determined that travelling on either version of Air Force One could expose him to an unacceptable level of danger.
A person familiar with the matter told CNN that the threat involved a shoulder-fired missile and was considered specific enough for officials to fear that Trump’s life would be at enormous risk if he travelled on either version of Air Force One.
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