BOGOTÁ, Colombia—For decades, Colombia elected establishment politicians who hewed to the center-right and helped make the country the U.S.’s closest ally in the region.
That era has come to a halt. In Sunday’s presidential election, voters will choose between two antiestablishment politicians. Gustavo Petro, a 62-year-old senator, is a leftist former guerrilla who says he wants to end oil exploration and print money to spur economic growth. Rodolfo Hernández, his rival, is a 77-year-old provincial real-estate mogul who didn’t hold rallies or speak from public squares. He reached voters through homemade TikTok videos, in which he calls himself “the Old Guy with Sass.”
