Colombia's Presidential Candidates Hold Final Campaign Rallies Before May 31 Election

Colombia's presidential election arrives in a week, and more than 40 million voters will decide who replaces Gustavo Petro and Francia Márquez in the country's highest offices. On Sunday, May 24th, the twelve candidates competing for the presidency held their final campaign events across the nation—last chances to consolidate support before the May 31st vote, and to position themselves either for a runoff scheduled for June 21st or for an outright first-round victory.

The race has crystallized around three frontrunners. Iván Cepeda, the congressman from the ruling Pacto Histórico coalition, leads in most polling. Abelardo de la Espriella, a lawyer running under the Defensores de la Patria banner, and Paloma Valencia, the senator from the Centro Democrático party, follow closely behind. The remaining nine candidates—including Claudia López, Sergio Fajardo, Santiago Botero, and others—poll below five percentage points each, yet their votes could prove decisive in determining which two candidates face off in the second round. Two candidates who initially entered the race, Luis Gilberto Murillo and Clara López, withdrew their candidacies to throw their support behind Cepeda, though Murillo's name will still appear on the ballot.

De la Espriella's closing rally in Medellín's La Macarena plaza drew crowds and produced the campaign's most incendiary moment. The candidate issued a direct threat to Colombia's illegal armed groups, naming them explicitly: the Clan del Golfo, the Central Command, the dissident factions, and various criminal organizations operating in cities and regions across the country. His declaration was unambiguous: if elected president, he would declare these groups "military objectives of the next president of the republic." The statement reverberated through the final hours of campaigning, signaling a hard-line security posture that distinguishes his candidacy from rivals.

Valencia held her closing event at Bogotá's Movistar Arena before roughly 15,000 supporters on the same Sunday. Recent polls showing her in third place seemed to sharpen her message. She hardened her rhetoric on security and constitutional order, directly opposing the government's "Total Peace" policy toward armed groups and attacking her rivals' proposals as capitulation to illegal actors and neocommunist economic reform. Former president Álvaro Uribe, who leads the Centro Democrático party that backs Valencia, amplified her campaign in the final hours, using his social media to attack Cepeda as a "candidate and promoter of terrorism" while linking him to drug trafficking, extortion, and the recruitment of minors. Uribe framed Valencia as the embodiment of "order and authority," emphasizing her focus on security, employment, education, and entrepreneurship.

Meanwhile, Cepeda's campaign drew large crowds in Barranquilla, where he held his own closing rally. Former Interior Minister Juan Fernando Cristo shared images of the packed streets and publicly endorsed both Cepeda and his running mate, Aida Quilcué. The contrast between the candidates' closing messages was stark: Cepeda's left-wing coalition emphasized continuity with Petro's agenda, while de la Espriella and Valencia offered security-focused alternatives rooted in confrontation with armed groups rather than negotiation.

The final week of campaigning exposed the ideological fault lines that will define Colombia's political direction. The question of how to handle illegal armed groups—through negotiation, military pressure, or some combination—has become the central dividing line. So too have economic policies, with the right accusing the left of class-based hatred and threatening employment and living standards, while the left defends its social agenda. With more than 40 million eligible voters and a field fractured enough that no candidate appears likely to win outright, the mathematics of the runoff loom large. The votes cast on May 31st will determine not just which two candidates advance, but which ideological vision—security through confrontation or security through dialogue—will shape the country's next four years.