Yves here. Rajiv Sethi makes the point that successfully bullying Colombia with tariff threats over deportation flights is the sort of show of crude power in a very uneven situation that looks likely to generate resistance, particularly from bigger players.
This tactic is backfiring with Trump’s bizarre aggressive statements towards Putin about Ukraine. The Ukraine-skeptic comment sphere, which includes quite a few Trump fans, is speaking almost with one voice as to what a dumb move this is. It does nothing to improve the US position in negotiations (charitably assuming they happen) and show Trump to be overeager (as in further weakening his stance) and wildly uninformed. And recall Trump threw away additional leverage he might have had by turning on the EU and NATO, who even if they can’t save Ukraine, could still make life difficult for Russia (think Kalingrad and the Baltic Sea, for starters). And while the US can buy coffee from places other than Colombia, experts have pointed out that the very few things the US still buys from Russia, like enriched uranium, are substances we need (and are thus also likely price inelastic too, so it’s not as if those small Russian sales would suffer).
And that’s before looking at the coffee trade through a broader lens:
If you’re wondering why we use the colorful phrase “social-democracy is the left wing of fascism,” try to understand how ghoulish it is to see this through the lens of “Americans will have to pay more for coffee.”
Coffee is one of the most egregious examples of unequal exchange. https://t.co/GUp0syjrhq
— A. V. Dremel 🔻 (@BmoreOrganized) January 27, 2025
Mind you, even though a lot of this looks like Trump engaged in dominance display, he has surrounded himself with men who roll the same way (think Tom Homans, Sebastian Gorka and Steve Witkoff). We’ll see soon enough what happens when this sort of threat display meets well-armed targets.
By Rajiv Sethi, Professor of Economics, Barnard College, Columbia University &; External Professor, Santa Fe Institute. Originally published at his site
The dispute between Colombia and the United States regarding deportation flights appears to have been resolved, and the threatened trade war between the two countries has been averted for the time being. The Colombian president wanted returning citizens to be treated with dignity and respect. Perhaps some concessions were made in this regard, though his government’s official statement does not contain specifics. The White House is declaring victory.
The American economy is about thirty times as large as that of Colombia. With the possible exception of cut flowers and coffee, turning to other suppliers for imported goods would have been quite easy. We are Colombia’s largest trading partner by far, accounting for a quarter of its exports. Meanwhile Columbia absorbs just one percent of our total exports. A prologed trade war would have imposed some costs on American consumers, especially with Valentine’s Day approaching. But it would have been utterly devastating for Colombia.
Furthermore, the range of threats extended far beyond tariffs—some Colombian nationals working for the World Bank had their visas revoked and were deportedduring the standoff. I suspect that this kind of heavy-handed tactic will be used with some frequency over the next few years.
Such exercise of raw power can bring other countries (and domestic institutions) to heel. It can produce decisive victories in the short run. But it can also have significant long term consequences, affecting patterns of trade and geopolitical alliances.
As an example, consider the oil price shocks of the 1970s, driven in part by the exercise of market power by the OPEC countries. The global price of crude oil quadrupled in January 1974 and inflation in the US reached double digits during that year. A second shock in 1979 pushed inflation even higher, and it took a severe recession engineered by the Federal Reserve to bring it back down. Meanwhile oil exporters enjoyed windfall profits even while slowing the depletion of their reserves.
Over time, though, a number of adjustments took place. People switched to smaller and more fuel-efficient vehicles. Japanese automakers (led by Toyota, Honda, and Nissan) met this demand and made major inroads in global markets. Their share of the US automobile market was negligible in 1970, but had risen to more than one-fifth a decade later. Several countries moved towards energy independence, with France achieving it—based largely on nuclear power—and becoming a major energy exporter. High prices induced non-member states to step up production, and tempted member states to periodically violate agreements to restrict output. All these changes progressively weakened the power of the cartel.
The shock experienced by Columbia is a lesson to others who would defy the Trump administration in any way—in fact it is intended as precicely as such a warning. The logic here is similar to that of the chain store paradox. Convince enough people that you are willing to hurt yourself in order to hurt them more, and you will often get your way.
But as with the oil price shocks, there will be long term consequences. Colombia (and other countries watching closely) will want to reduce their vulnerability to such actions, by changing their patterns of trade and their geopolitical alliances.
The only serious countervailing force in global affairs at the moment is China, which demonstated its capacity for shifting the technological frontier with the release of DeepSeek just a few days ago. The high-performance chip maker Nvidia lost $600 billion in value in a single day as anticipated demand for its most lucrative products was revised downwards:
These two geopolitical shocks—the humiliation of a relatively small trading partner and a shot across the bow by a much larger one—both have implications for what the future might bring. The needless humiliation will push Colombia and other potential victims into the arms of an emerging global power, and the embrace will be reciprocated. While champagne corks are popping to celebrate a small victory against a weak adversary, quiet celebrations may also be underway on the other side of the world.
Columbia should be concerned that the neighbor to the north is seeking to re-exert its influence in the region to counter China, and with that comes an existential danger that goes much deeper than just being humiliated.
I understand that Petro won that battle. The Trump administration unilaterally ignored established protocol on these repatriation flights, including ones that protect the human rights of the migrants. Petro refused to play along, rejected the flight, and forced the US government to agree to not use military personnel ( but can use military planes) and not chain or handcuff the Colombian citizens. He succeeded in defending the human rights of his citizens, playing a high stake game of chicken with Trump, in which Trump backed down. I find it interesting the media and other analysts think otherwise.
The original position was not to accept deportation flights at all, or did you miss that?
In addition, he got the US not to use military personnel only by sending the Colombian presidential plane to the US to pick up the first deportees. That does not look like win but as best spin about making a less than 100% climbdown.
https://www.aljazeera.com/economy/2025/1/27/how-trump-coerced-colombia-to-accept-deportees-by-threatening-us-tariff-war
https://archive.is/ohGTp#selection-1339.0-1357.256 (Reuters)
If any were arrested, the US standard is to use Federal marshals and handcuffs (and often ankle chains). As in this is the same process as used on US citizens. Federal marshals are not the military. So the US may continue to treat the deportees as prisoners if any were arrested (as opposed to deported pursuant to getting final deportation orders).
Not accepting deportees at all was not realistic and not an international norm. Transporting deportees in cargo planes (I guess how military planes look to civilians and any conveyances not designed for civilian humans is not.
And Columbia is not the only protesting country.
Yes, again, the issue Colombia and Mexico are having is “how” the US is transporting the deportees. They never took the position of not accepting deportees, on the contrary, the Presidents of both countries have made it explicitly clear that their policy is to receive all their citizens.
The United Nations is already involved in giving support to the complaints from Brazil and Colombia on “how” the Trump administration is treating the deportees (not that he is deporting them)
You are still missing the point. The US has made no commitment regarding how they are transported save the military personnel will not handle the detainees while on military planes.
An example: Colombia exports coffee to USA. USA rejects shipment of coffee because the coffee sacks were palletized on non-HT wooden pallets (not allowed in international trade)
USA did not change their policy on receiving Colombian coffee, they just applied current regulations and rejected a shipment because it did not comply.
Let’s say the Colombian president then says the US has to receive the coffee anyways, if not he will put huge tariffs on all US imports into Colombia.
US responds by saying no, you must use HT wooden pallets, and if you put tarriffs on us , we will put tarrifs on you.
The two countries come to an agreement and trade war averted.
Coffee is imported to US on HT pallets.
The US won this battle by not breaking to Colombian demands to ship coffee on non-HT pallets.
US does not care if Colombia has or has not made any commitments on whether they will use HT pallets with their coffee shipments in the future. The US already made clear they will have to or the coffee will not be imported.
Let’s wait and see if the next deportation flights abide by the established protocol or not. And yes, it is common knowledge with evidence that the two rejected flights were breaking protocol, with military personnel and all passengers handcuffed
Lordie, you are seriously tying to say the US obeys laws and respects treaties? This is the US that unilaterally broke the JCOPA, is violating the WTO to impose sanctions on China, violated the First Amendment in its own country to pressure social media companies to engage in censorship, blew up the NordStream pipeline, and illegally seized Russian financial assets? Seriously? Sethi described how the US does not need Colombian exports. There are plenty of coffee provider. Brazil is a bigger supplier to the US than Colombia.
So Colombia tariffs US products? So what? It would make no difference to the US economy. Trump isn’t cowed by Canada threatening retaliatory tariffs even though we actually would be inconvenienced if we had to pay more for Canadian products. His approach is unwise and destructive but on a raw power level, it works.
And your final “common knowledge” claim is what we here call Making Shit Up. Aljazeera covered the timeline and the blow by blow between Pedro and Trump in detail. There is no way Pedro could have known how the Colombian deportees were being kept. There were not reporters or Colombian diplos embedded to watch them go from transport vehicles to the plane or see if and how they were secured on the plane and report to the Colombian government or press. And Pedro never once presented any evidence of mistreatment by the Americans.
There were no Colombian witnesses to inform him about what was happening on a US military jet as it was being loaded or in flight. And pray tell, how could there have been?
Pedro based his action completely on the Brazilian deportees and AN ASSUMPTION that the same was happening to the Colombians being transported. So he acted without any evidence of mistreatment of Colombian citizens. He may have been proven correct later via testimony of the Colombians who returned to the US and were flown out a second time, but he did not have any at the time he barred the landings.
It’s difficult to fathom your argument. Trump is herding Colombians out of the US in bulk. You are trying to preserve the fiction of Colombia scoring a win because they aren’t being shackled on the flight (even assuming Trump isn’t going to resort to that again as Yves points out could still happen)? They likely were before being loaded on the flights and held in US jails. And you are seriously trying to claim there is dignity in this process?
The broader impact of this event is that it will likely be instructive to BRICS and deepen their cooperation. Trump is the king of political stunts, and this is one of them; playing to his political base, as the rest of the world plans for the future. In time, Americans are going to see more than the price of coffee inflate.
Yes, this was the point Sethi made but not as directly.
It should be understood that the Trump administration operates with a calculus of irrationality. Trump’s advisors know that theatrical displays of “toughness” will stick in the minds of Trump partisans while quiet compromises dictated by economic and military realities will barely register. The model of professional wrestling is instructive. A great deal of careful planning goes into the staging of spectacles that are meant to entertain, but which have little to do with actual combat.
Our esteemed host once described Trump as “the naked id” and that’s exactly what he is and why some people like him and others hate him or even think he is crazy. Many of those who like him see these primitive displays of dominance as the quiet out loud since our entire foreign policy is a display of dominance by people who pretend to be social justice warriors fighting for “democracy.”
Of course Trump’s recklessness can be dangerous and cruel as in the case of Venezuela and Iran but it’s telling that when fake liberal Biden took over he continued the same policies.
So what we have just acquired may not be wise leadership but better for the rest of the planet than the submissive stance that has evolved in places like Europe. Honesty is the best policy or at least a lot better than Biden and all his scheming.
“The original position was not to accept deportation flights at all, or did you miss that?”
This is just not true. This was the strawman the Trump admin put up. Colombia receives repatriation flights all the time, there are established protocol between the two countries. This is a daily thing.
The president of Colombia was very clear, as was the Mexican President, that they will always be open to receive their citizens. There is not one shed of evidence either country changed policy and was going to stop receiving deportation flights. The issue has been the US breaking established protocol for these flights.
It will be interesting to learn the stories about the 110 Colombians on those flights, who are now coming back to Colombia in a Colombian military plane without handcuffs.
Sorry, the Colombia DID refuse the first deportation flights from the Trump Administraion. Your assertion is false.
See AlJazeera which has a timeline and is NOT a US outlet:
https://www.aljazeera.com/economy/2025/1/27/how-trump-coerced-colombia-to-accept-deportees-by-threatening-us-tariff-war
In addition:
“If any were arrested, the US standard is to use Federal marshals and handcuffs (and often ankle chains). ” When American will notice that they allow police etc. to treat them more brutally than in other countries?
There were many cases of sick, or injured or pregnant persons to be cuffed to their hospital beds. People are routinely handcuffed behind their backs for no reasons whatsoever. E.g. three policemen find a slim 11 year old girl that matches a vague description of a car thief, so waiting for clarification they keep the girl hancuffed behind her back (released after getting a photo of the suspect who was not small, not slim etc)
American normal is not normal
This is “whataboutism” which is a subset of “tu quoque” which is an invalid form of argument. It’s also a straw man, as it implies I support the practice.
The point here is whether Colombia climbed down. It did. Agreeing not to have the military handle the deportees does not = a commitment not to handcuff them.
And as for treatment of prisoners, I suggest you read about how Switzerland just treated reporter Ali Abunimah: https://x.com/AliAbunimah/status/1883973272695627992
The EU guidelines for prisoner transport are here. The big concern seems to be not putting them in overly small cages, not overcrowding, making sure they get enough air, are not subjected to overheating or freezing, etc. Handcuffs and body restraints allowed if assessed risk warrants it. Handcuffing behind the back disfavored:
https://rm.coe.int/16808b631d
So you would be happier if they were transported in cages as the EU allows?
They refused them because they did not follow established protocol for these repatriation flights, not because there was a change in policy in receiving deported citizens.
Petro was clear on that from the beginning. The horror stories of the Brazilian flight were just coming out and he saw it as important to make sure Colombian citizens human rights were respected.
To be clear, the Colombian government never changed their policy with the US in receiving Colombian deportees. The claim that they did is a fiction of the Trump administration
They refused two flights with no evidence of how Colombian citizens were being treated. That IS a change in policy.
European elites loath Trump, but they are not buying the Colombian effort to save face. For instance, from Le Monde in US-Colombia diplomatic row: A mix of blackmail, intimidation and real concessions:
“Sebastian Gorky” is clearly a typo. Gorka ain’t no Gorky, no contributions to literature whatsoever, unless of course someone uses his buffoonish bravado to create a character in a broad satire of late Imperial folly. An excellent piece, nonetheless.
In order to avoid confusion, he should change his last name to Sikorsky.
Sorry, I have name dyslexia. Fixing.
I guess that this was Trump making Colombia an ‘object lesson’ and it was probably planned out last year. Trump chose a country that was vary large in size and has had a very long connection with the US. But Trump thought it a good idea to blow up US-Colombia relations in order to get his way with other Central & South American countries as what are they going to do about it. Even China has said that they will take their citizens back – provided that the US proves that they are Chinese citizens.
Columbian Cartel in Punta del Este puts out a hit?
If they are from Taiwan, do they count as Chinese?
A bully enters the playground and slaps a random kid. That is a skilful 3D tic tac toe move there. Next would be stealing someone’s lunch, and then throwing firecrackers at disabled kids.
Just reading now that China canceled 690B in US imports, soybeans is a big one with Brazil the winner.