Colombia’s leftwing candidate concedes to Trump-endorsed millionaire

The defeated leftwing candidate in Colombia’s presidential runoff conceded to the far-right, Trump-admiring millionaire lawyer Abelardo de la Espriella after the official count closely matched a preliminary tally that had shown him winning by less than 1% of the vote.

Senator Iván Cepeda and President Gustavo Petro had initially refused to recognise the preliminary results, saying they would wait for the official scrutiny. Once the official count showed a 99.997% match, Cepeda called a press conference in Bogotá and accepted the result "as an act of democratic responsibility" to help foster coexistence, peace and dialogue.

Cepeda finished with 12.7m votes, about 250,000 fewer than De la Espriella’s 12.96m, and warned that accepting the result did not mean renouncing the truth or remaining silent about what he called serious issues that marked the campaign.

Colombia, Bogotá

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