Colombian congressional and presidential elections - March 13/May 29/June 19, 2022

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Pacto - 26.4% reporting
Petro 79.51
Francia 14.76
Romero 4.42
Arelis 0.89
Saade 0.38

1.22 million votes so far

Equipo - 26.4% reporting
Fico 56.7
Barguil 15.35
Char 14.04
Lizarazo 7.76
Penalosa 6.14

875k votes

Centro - 30.4% reporting
Fajardo 30.4
Amaya 28.4
Galán 20.6
Gaviria 13.6
Robledo 6.9

685k votes

Early predictions: Petro, Fico and Fajardo win their primaries. The Pacto Histórico gets great turnout, the Equipo decent-ish turnout and the centrists a terribly low turnout.

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Pacto - 45.5% reporting
Petro 79.6
Francia 14.7
Romero 4.3

2.3 million votes so far

Equipo - 44% reporting
Fico 54
Char 16
Barguil 15.9
Lizarazo 7.6
Penalosa 6.6

1.58k votes

Centro - 39.7% reporting
Fajardo 31.1
Amaya 26.5
Galán 21
Gaviria 14.4
Robledo 7

928k votes

The trends continue.

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The Pacto's turnout is so impressive that Francia Márquez already has nearly 400,000 votes which is more than Fajardo, Char, Barguil etc. right now!

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Pacto - 63.6% reporting
Petro 80
Francia 14.5
Romero 4.3

3.48 million - basically has already matched 2018 leftwing primary turnout

Equipo - 62.9% reporting
Fico 54.6
Barguil 16.1
Char 16
Lizarazo 7
Penalosa 6.3

2.44 million

Centro - 60.1% reporting
Fajardo 32
Amaya 24
Galán 21.7
Gaviria 15.1
Robledo 7.2

1.43 million - this is disastrous turnout for them, pathetic stuff. Congrats on your collective seppuku guys!

In terms of votes for all candidates across primaries we have:
Petro 2.68 million
Fico 1.28 million
Francia 484.7k (!!!)
Fajardo 435.8k
Barguil 380.8k
Char 376.5k

Fico's good result and landslide in his coalition consolidates him as the right's candidate - Zuluaga will likely be sacrificed by the Eternal President, Vargas Lleras probably won't run - and he can emerge as Petro's main challenger. Incredible stuff for Francia Márquez, so glad to see her do so well.

[icc]

Is there a way to see where in Bogotá the votes currently reported are coming from? Doesn’t seem to be an option to break it down by borough (on the mobile site at least).

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Is there a way to see where in Bogotá the votes currently reported are coming from? Doesn’t seem to be an option to break it down by borough (on the mobile site at least).

No, Bogotá is counted a single municipality and that's the lowest levels these results are presented at. The results by locality will only be available with the escrutinio (official vote count) in a few days, and in a much less user-friendly format.

Another update on the primaries, although they're losing their interest before we transition to congressional results

Pacto (77.2%)
Petro 80.3
Francia 14.2
Romero 4.2

4.37 million votes - should reach 5 million, I guess?

Equipo (76.8%)
Fico 54.6
Char 16.8
Barguil 15.8
Lizarazo 6.8
Penalosa 6.1 (lol - truly a disastrous result for him)

3 million votes

Centro (74.8%)
Fajardo 32.7
Amaya 22.6
Galán 22
Gaviria 15.4
Robledo 7.4

1.77 million votes

Might I say that overall primary turnout is... unimpressive? We're just at 9 million votes right now - it will reach 10+ million but we're a long way from the 16 million votes some people suggested. This doesn't mean that overall turnout in these elections will be bad, though - just means fewer people voted in these primaries than we had anticipated.

[kaoras]

Linear extrapolation gives Pacto 5,7 million turnout and has been going up as the count progresses since the later mesas have more votes.

[kaoras]

Also, I noticed that in the Chamber there is a (I assume a regional) list called "Pacto Histórico" but which has the logos of CR, Liberals, Conservatives, de la U... Did they seriously try to mislead voters in such a cartoonish way?

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Also, I noticed that in the Chamber there is a (I assume a regional) list called "Pacto Histórico" but which has the logos of CR, Liberals, Conservatives, de la U... Did they seriously try to mislead voters in such a cartoonish way?

Going through the result, seems like it's from Bolívar and it's certainly a mistake. The actual ballot paper there has the Pacto's normal logo.

That was a department where the Pacto's list created quite a firestorm: initially the list there included former Partido de la U senator Sandra Villadiego, the wife of convicted parapolítico Miguel Ángel Rangel. This was denounced by certain members of the Pacto, like Bogotá rep. David Racero, while Petro disingenuously tried to wash his hands of the scandal. In February, the Pacto's list was revoked by the CNE for not meeting the gender quota (30%), so a new closed list was registered without Villadiego. The new list hasn't been entirely of local controversies either (the winners from the new list included a candidate close to the clownish mayor of Cartagena, William Dau).

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A look at the Senate with 52% reporting:

Pacto Histórico 14.88%
Conservative 13.62%
Liberal 12.68%
Greens-CE 12.43%
CD 11.28%
CR 9.57%
La U 8.79%
MIRA-CJL 3.72%
--
FC 2.42%
NL 1.87%
(blank votes 7.07%)

It's very fragmented but the Pacto should be the largest party with the Conservatives or Liberals as the second largest party. We'd be looking at pretty bad results overall for uribismo, CR and La U. However, the Caribbean is lagging on reporting, so the results could still change pretty significantly for some parties.

BTW: the individual candidate with the most votes in the Green-CE list right now is... some dumb viral YouTuber/influencer who apparently makes revoltingly stupid videos. He already has over 100k preferential votes (predominantly from Santander) while de la Calle only has 74,900 so far. And one of the Afro seats could go to Miguel Polo Polo, a stupid far-right influencer close to María Fernanda Cabal. We live in the dumbest timeline.

[kaoras]

It seems that the Pacto is doing better in the Chamber than in the Senate? Adding all the small lists I get them to 19% in the Chamber (slightly lower without counting the Polo-Green alliance)

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Senate result at 91% reporting and a seat projection from the Registraduría:

Pacto 14.5% - 17 seats
Cons. 13.4% - 15
Lib. 12.6% - 15
Green-CE 12.2% - 14
CD 11.8% - 14
CR 9.8% - 11
La U 9% - 10
MIRA-CJL 3.7% - 4
Indigenous seats - 2 (MAIS and AICO)
Comunes (ex-FARC) - 5 ex oficio
--
FC 2.6%
NL 2%

The winners are the Pacto and to a lesser extent the Conservatives, Liberals and Greens-CE. The losers are uribismo, CR, La U, MIRA-CJL and Nuevo Liberalismo.

There's also a seat projection for the House but it's a real mess and I'll need some time to go through it properly tomorrow. But it seems as if the Liberals will remain the largest party with a few more seats than the Pacto, which was much better than I expected in actually winning seats in several departments. In Santander, Rodolfo's Liga won the most votes and will have 2 seats.

Also, turnout is really not that high: with 91% reporting it is only at 42%.

edit: some final-ish turnout numbers for the primaries: Pacto 5.7 million, Equipo 4 million, CE 2.2 million. About 12 million votes in the primaries in total: good, but not great.

I'll call it a night and crunch numbers tomorrow again. I hope my 'coverage' was half-useful.

[icc]

So the counting for the preconteo is now all but finished.

Are there usually meaningful differences between the preconteo and escrutinio?

[icc]

In terms of comparing turnout in the different primaries:

The Pacto 'won' the turnout battle almost everywhere.

Equipo por Colombia came out on top in: Antioquia, Atlántico, Caldas, Córdoba, Consulados (abroad) Norte de Santander and Quindío - so basically the very strongest anti-leftist areas (though excluding Casanare), plus a couple of departamentos in the Caribbean with extremely strong machines. Notably (or perhaps not), those machines were not working for Gutiérrez, the winner of the consulta.

Centro Esperanza had most votes cast (by far) only in Boyacá, where Carlos Amaya's machines were working overtime, helping to earn him a surprisingly strong third place in the consulta.

Though you can clearly see where machines have made a big difference, most obviously in the Caribbean, it's interesting how similar the patterns of strength are to those from the 2018 first round.

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So the counting for the preconteo is now all but finished.

Are there usually meaningful differences between the preconteo and escrutinio?

Yes, there could be. In 2018, CJL was below the Senate threshold in the preconteo but 'found' nearly 34,000 more votes in the escrutinio which brought them over the threshold and won them three seats (all others parties saw their votes change by no more than 10,000 in either direction, except for the Polo which lost about 11,000).

For open lists, the escrutinio can also change the names of those who get in and those who don't, particularly for those candidates who are hovering right at the line (above or below). The escrutinio, I think, is also where any kind of fraud or dirty tricks are likely because of the sheer volume of votes and numbers to be counted and added everywhere and how easy it is to manipulate a few votes here and there in many places without people noticing. Like every time, I expect there will be accusations and allegations of fraud.

This PDF from the MOE details the differences between the two counts in 2018: https://www.moe.org.co/wp-content/uploads/2018/06/Resultados-Congreso-2018.pdf

I have a lot of analysis and maps to put together so I will have more stuff soon but for now the big news of the day: Zuluaga has dropped out and endorsed Fico. There was no way forward for him, and Uribe had called for a caucus meeting for tomorrow afternoon and 'invited' Zuluaga, so he understood that he needed to drop out to avoid the humiliation of another ritual sacrifice by the head priest of the cult (he already had a ritual sacrifice of this kind in 2017 when Uribe killed his presidential pre-candidacy because of the Odebrecht scandal). The main buzz this week will be about the running mates for the three primary winners: Fico might consolidate his newfound status as the uribista candidate by picking an uribista, Petro will likely pick a woman but probably not Francia Márquez (in theory, there had been the unwritten understanding that the runner-up would be his running-mate, but Petro never really committed to that and Francia has said today she has no burning ambition to hold an office) and will probably try to shore up his centrist/liberal flank with a running-mate and Fajardo will probably try to reunite the centre with his running-mate pick. Vargas Lleras should end his silly charade and probably won't run, as there's really no real path for him now. And we should hear from Cesar Gaviria about which way the Liberal Party will go: he very well could formally endorse Petro, given that he is unlikely to endorse the right (after he did so with Duque in the 2018 runoff and he didn't like what he got from that) and he hates Fajardo.

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OK, to start off, here are some maps of the primaries:

First, the turnout race:


Overall, of voters who participated in a primary (two-thirds of those who voted), 47.4% (5.8 million) voted for the Pacto, 33.9% voted for the right (4.1 million) and 18.7% for the centre (2.28 million). As icc wrote, the Pacto won nearly everywhere except for 6 departments where more people voted for the right's primary and Boyacá where most people voted for the centre (the right also narrowly had more votes with expats). Overall this is very good for the Pacto: they won the turnout game in more right-leaning regions like Casanare, Tolima, Huila, Santander and put up a good fight in the Eje Cafetero. The Caribbean coast was their only weak point, but as Atlántico and Córdoba show, this has a lot to do with overwhelming favourite son + machine dynamics for Char and Barguil respectively. The Pacto utterly dominated in Chocó, Cauca, Putumayo and Nariño, unsurprisingly: over 75% of primary votes there were in the Pacto's primary. The right didn't quite dominate anywhere like this: their best result was Antioquia, where close to 60% of votes were in the right-wing primary.

The centre only won in Boyacá, where 59.3% of primary voters voted in the centrist party, and did so overwhelmingly for local son Carlos Amaya (who also has machines and public apparatus support there). The centre was in 'second place' in terms of primary turnout in Bogotá (27.9% of votes vs 49.2% for the Pacto and 23% for the right) and Cundinamarca (31% of votes vs 46.1% for the Pacto and 23% for the right). As expected, the Caribbean remained a dead zone for the centre: in all Caribbean departments except for insular San Andrés, the centrist primary lagged way behind with less than 10% of the total primary turnout (the lowest was Córdoba, where only 4% of primary voters voted in the centrist primary: Barguil is from there and Petro was born there), it also had less than 10% of the total primary turnout in Chocó, Cauca and Putumayo.

Next, I compared Pacto turnout in raw votes to left-wing primary turnout in raw votes in 2018 (% change in raw votes)



Great stuff for the Pacto: in all but one department they won more votes than the left's primary had in 2018. The only department was Magdalena, where their votes dropped by 13%: in 2018, local favourite son (now governor, then former mayor of Santa Marta) Carlos Caicedo was Petro's only primary rival and won the department, so without him competing this year, turnout dipped slightly (Petro still won a lot more votes there than in 2018: from 66.5k to 123k). In general terms, the left-wing vote totals did not increase by all that much in the Caribbean (except for San Andrés), because the left was already strong there in 2018 and it needed to contend with two local candidates in the right's primary dragging a lot of votes. It also didn't gain much in Boyacá, where the left wasn't strong in 2018 but where Amaya had a huge favourite son pull.

The good news for the Pacto are the significant vote increases in Paisa country (Antioquia + Eje Cafetero): a 140% increase in Antioquia (from 168.9k to 405.7k), a 151% increase in Risaralda, a 156% increase in Caldas, 109% in Quindío. Petro was looking exactly for that, and he got it: doesn't change that the Paisa country is fundamentally conservative, but Petro couldn't afford to be as weak there this year as he was in 2018. Another good data point for the Pacto: a 142.6% increase in the Valle, going from 284.4k to 690k and therefore soundly beating the right in the turnout game. The biggest gains for the left in votes came from the remote former national territories of Guainía, Vaupés, Guaviare and San Andrés as well as expats (overall expat turnout was a bit higher than in 2018): in the case of a tiny electorate like Guainía this means going from 760 votes to 2,700 votes.

I did the same exercise with the right-wing primaries in raw votes from 2018 to 2022:



This, on the other hand, isn't particularly great for the right: they failed to match the right's 2018 primary turnout (6.1 million) in all but 4 departments and the expats. The turnout increases all came from the Caribbean, and they were driven by favourite sons Barguil (Córdoba: +43%) and Char (Atlántico +78%, Magdalena +38%, San Andrés +0.1%). Turnout was not down all that much from 2018 in the other Caribbean departments: Sucre (-14%), La Guajira (-15.5%) and Bolívar (-16.9%). Turnout in Antioquia was very good and came close to 2018 levels (just -3.7%, from 997.9k to 960.8k), thanks to Fico's huge favourite son vote. The biggest dropoffs were in Boyacá (-77.5%), again because of Amaya most likely, as well as Casanare (-72.9%) and Vichada (-72.8%), the latter two are uribista departments so this could indicate that uribistas there didn't vote in the right-wing primary this year. Santander also saw right-wing votes fall by 68.5%, which I suspect might be a case of ex-uribistas/right-wingers who are now rodolfistas following Rodolfo's orders not to vote in the primaries.

Now here is a map of the right-wing primary



As I anticipated, there were very strong regional patterns in this one. Fico did well everywhere except the Caribbean but he got a ridiculous 92.4% in Antioquia (!). Barguil won 82% in Córdoba (his native department) and 47% in Sucre (neighbouring, and where he was backed by the dominant Liberal faction which controls the governorship). Char won 88.3% in Atlántico (Barranquilla etc.) and 75.2% in neighbouring Magdalena, where charista machines are very strong too, as well as 58% in La Guajira, 50.6% in Cesar, 46.1% in Bolívar and 42.9% in San Andrés. But Char was a regional candidate: half of all his votes nationally came from Atlántico, and 83% of all his votes came from the departments he won. Elsewhere, Char was a non-factor, often last (Bogotá 4.1%, Valle 3%, Santander 7.3%, Antioquia 0.8%, Caldas 1.4%, Cundinamarca 4.3%)... Barguil had a favourite son which accounted for 28% of all his votes, and while his strategy of relying heavily on Conservative machines to also vote for him didn't work out, it did allow him to be more of a national candidate with decent numbers in many places (Santander 23.6%, Boyacá 24.2%, Bogotá 12%, Cundinamarca 19.3%, Tolima 29.8%, Nariño 24.5%, Huila 17.2%). Enrique Peñalosa proves to us, for the umpteenth time, that he's a terrible candidate and the dictionary definition of paper tiger, with terrible results: he lost in Bogotá with just 19% against 55.8% for Fico (who is the most Medellín guy imaginable), and his only other decent result was the Valle (14.4%) thanks to Dilian Francisca Toro (his Ted Cruz/Carly Fiorina 2016-like 'running mate') although even that was pretty bad (he did win Toro's hometown of Guacarí though lol). Lizarazo did surprisingly well, I assume thanks to the MIRA's disciplined vote.

The centrist primary


(I don't know why I put Fajardo in orange, he should ideally be green, but that's already taken...)

Fajardo won nearly everywhere. He did best in his native Antioquia (52.2%). Carlos Amaya was the surprise of the primary with his very good result (overall, 451k votes and nearly 21%), but this was, as pointed out, primarily because Boyacá had, by far, the highest turnout of any place in a low-turnout primary and, well, he won 85% in Boyacá with his favourite son status + machines. 43% of all his votes came from Boyacá. He also won in Casanare which 'neighbours' Boyacá (though they're separated by the Cordillera Oriental). He also got a decent result in Bogotá (17.6% or 116.9k vote), probably a result both of 'opinion' and his faction's 'quotas' in the district administration, and in Cundinamarca (22.5%) with many victories in municipalities bordering Boyacá (they form a kind of common geographic and cultural region). Elsewhere, he was much weaker. Galán won Nariño (he also did well in Cauca with 33%) and Gaviria won La Guajira: I have no good idea why, the vagaries of low turnout? Galán also did very well in Santander (30%, less than 2% behind Fajardo), which is where his father was from. Cundinamarca was a 4-way mess: Fajardo 27.6%, Galán 25.4%, Amaya 22.5%, Gaviria 19.3%: as mentioned, Amaya did well in municipalities close to Boyacá (as well as Madrid and Mosquera in the eastern suburbs of Bogotá), Galán won in Soacha (lower-income massive extension/suburb of Bogotá where his father was murdered in 1989), Girardot and Facatativá while Gaviria had machine support from former governor Jorge Rey which won him Funza (Rey's stronghold).

A map of the Pacto primary is pointless because it's all dark shades of something: the 'lowest' result for Petro was expats (69.6%) and his best was his birthplace of Córdoba (94.5%). He was held below 75% in Antioquia (70.2%), Chocó (73%), Caldas (71.2%), Santander (72.8%) and Nte de Santander (71.9%). Francia Márquez got a big 'opinion vote' in Bogotá (19.8%), Medellín (27.7%), Bucaramanga (25.6%), Cúcuta (21.4%), Manizales (22.8%), Pereira (19.2%), Envigado (32.6%), Bello (23.7%) and Itagui (26%), although her numbers were weaker in Cali (13.4%) and Popayán (8.1%) notably. She won 23% in Chocó, the only black-majority department in Colombia, and got 28.2% in Buenaventura and 28.9% in Tumaco, the two major black-majority Pacific port cities. Her result in her native Cauca was poor (11.4%) but she won 67.8% in Suárez, where she's from. Arelis Uriana won 11% and second in her native Guajira, while Camilo Romero only managed 7.5% and third in Nariño where he was governor (and 4.3% in Bogotá where he's spent the other part of his political life).

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Senate pre-count at 99.4% completed:

Pacto Histórico 14.14% - 16 seats (+8)
Conservative 13.59% - 16 seats (+2)
Liberal 12.74% - 15 seats (+1)
Green-Centro Esperanza 12.02% - 14 seats (+5)
Centro Democrático 11.85% - 14 seats (-5)
Cambio Radical 9.89% - 11 seats (-5)
Partido de la U 9.25% - 10 seats (-4)
MIRA-CJL 3.63% - 4 seats (-2)
Comunes (ex-FARC) 0.19% - 5 seats (nc)
Indigenous constituency - 2 seats (MAIS and AICO, both part of the Pacto)
--
Fuerza Ciudadana 2.7%
Nuevo Liberalismo 2.02%
Estamos Listas 0.66%
SOS Colombia 0.31%
Genta Nueva 0.21%
MSN 0.17%
Movimiento Unitario Metapolítico 0.07%
Blank vote 6.49%



Turnout was 46.45%, down from 48.8% in 2018. Overall, 18 million people voted, up just a bit from 2018 (17.8 million). There were 16.27 million valid votes in the national constituency, which is up significantly from 2018 (14.47 million) as invalid votes, thanks to the new ballot, fell to 4.2% (lowest since the 2003 electoral reform), and there were 3% of unmarked votes. The number of blank votes (which are valid votes in Colombia) was high: 1 million, or 6.5%, up from 4.7% in 2018. 503.9k voted for the indigenous constituency although only two-thirds of those votes were valid (a lot of unmarked and invalid votes for whatever reason) and there was still a lot of blank votes (36.5%).

The major winner is the Pacto, which will be the largest caucus in the Senate (counting the two indigenous seats, they would have 18 seats), the first time a left-wing party forms the single largest bloc in the Senate. They didn't quite win as many seats as they would have liked, and Petro complained today about the "mistaken political decisions" of Fuerza Ciudadana - Caicedo's movement got 'burned' (quemado is Colombian political lingo for defeated) but came close to the threshold, with 2.7%. My quick math suggests that the Pacto could have won 19 seats if all of FC's votes had gone with them. Overall, the Pacto won 2.3 million votes, or 2.7 million including FC, compared to 5.8 million votes in the Pacto's primary and Petro's 4.4 million votes there: this is about 40-46% of the primary turnout and 52-60% of Petro's primary vote. So, Petro did not completely succeed in presidentializing the congressional elections, but it's much better than in 2018.

The Pacto's Senate caucus of 16 seats will see the return of familiar faces of the left: Piedad Córdoba and Clara López, and representation of the different groups of the Pacto with the notable exception of Francia Márquez. It seems as if boyacense peasant leader César Pachón (MAIS rep. for Boyacá), who was seventeenth on the list, just missed out on a seat. On the other hand, misogynistic pig Álex Flórez (star of elbowgate, Colombian edition), a comfortable eleventh on the list, is safely in - as is Esmeralda Hernández (14th) whose main claim to fame is being Camilo Romero's sister in law.

The Conservatives did quite well - not a lot of people expected them to do as well, I think, although I anticipated that they could at least retain what they have (in fact, they gained 2 more seats). Their vote, 2 million in the past two elections, increased 2.2 million, and gained about 1% in percentage share terms. The reason? It's a mix of successful machines pushed by powerful governorships (in Colombian politics/congressional elections, there's rarely anything better than having a family member as governor) like in Bolívar (Blel clan) and Tolima (Barreto clan), a lot of traditional machine politicians significantly growing their vote totals boosting the party (Carlos Andrés Trujillo, boss of the powerful Itagüí group, grew his vote from 86.7k to 159.8k with a good chunk of it outside Antioquia; Marcos Daniel Pineda, former two-term mayor of Montería in Córdoba and son of retiring senator Nora García Burgos inherited his mother's seat and grew the vote from 96.9k to 152.8k), new machines coming on board (the Aguilar clan, which was with CR in 2018, won a seat with 78.4k for their candidate, who wasn't a family member) as well as some 'opinion' (the surprise here is Óscar Mauricio Giraldo, who campaigned on social conservatism as the 'senator of the family', without any machine support that I know of, and he got 105.6k votes). However, a very notable quemado (defeated candidate) is Laureano 'el gato volador' Acuña, a deadweight and stupid senator infamously said to be the best vote buyer in Colombia (during the campaign a leaked recording of him talking about the need to buy 70,000 votes came out), who ranked 17th of the candidates, with 60.1k votes compared to 82.8k in 2018. Incidentally, La Silla Vacía's Twitter stream yesterday shared the audio of a vote buyer who was complaining that Acuña's people weren't keeping their word with them... But I'll note that Acuña is just 4,000 votes shy of stealing that last seat, and if anyone can make votes appear through the dark arts, it's him.

The Liberals also did quite well, considering their numbers coming in: they won 12.7% and 2 million votes, up a bit from 1.9 million in 2018, and gained one seat. It is all the more impressive considering several important incumbents were not seeking re-election and not leaving heirs behind in the party: Luis Fernando Velasco (now in the Pacto), Andrés Cristo (Juan Fernando Cristo's brother), Guillermo García Realpe (supports Petro) and Rodrigo Villalba. César Gaviria's strategy of betting heavily on existing, new and recycled traditional machine politicians and clans, particularly in the Caribbean region, worked wonders: many incumbents or heirs significantly grew their votes from 2018, newly powerful groups like the governor of Sucre's sister Karina Espinosa (she won 121.9k votes, the third most of any Liberal candidate) and some representatives very successfully made the jump to the Senate, notably Nte de Santander's Alejandro Carlos Chacón who got 117.8k votes (over half of it from outside his department). Lidio Arturo García Turbay was once again the party's top ranked vote-getter with 157k, up from 117k in 2018 (impressive given that in 2018 his cousin Dumek was governor of Bolívar, and while he still has quotas there, the governor is Vicentico Blel, sister of Conservative senator Nadya Blel). Juan Pablo Gallo, former mayor of Pereira, won 134.5k votes, the second most of any Liberal candidate, boosting the Liberals to 35% of the vote in Risaralda (César Gaviria's native department). The Liberals also benefited from new 'imports': Claudia Pérez Giraldo, out of nowhere, won 110.3k votes (!) by inheriting the machine of her brother-in-law Eduardo Pulgar (corrupt Partido de la U senator currently in prison for bribing a judge), who managed her campaign from jail; as well as the MCI evangelicals, electing Sara Castellanos (the daughter of the church's owners, and outgoing CR senator Claudia Castellanos) with 63.1k votes (about 3000 less than her mom in 2018, so I'm glad her opportunistic and annoying 'referendum for life' campaign didn't work out in her favour).

So while the centrist primary was self-inflicted disaster, the Greens-Centro Esperanza coalition list did better than I expected: 1.95 million votes, or 12%, up from 1.3 million in 2018 (when it was boosted by Mockus), giving them 14 seats, up 5. That is less than the number of votes in the centrist primary, but you can't assume that everybody who voted in the primary voted for the list, or vice-versa.

There were several surprises, but one of the biggest surprises of the election, was Jota Pe Hernández, a viral YouTuber/influencer who took the political world by surprise by winning 189.2k votes 'out of nowhere' - more than Humberto de la Calle (187.29k), and the third most votes of any candidate on an open list this year. Nobody in the political world had heard of him, but he has 1.2 million followers on YouTube and 778,000 on Facebook, making 'newscaster-style' sensationalist and clickbait political videos attacking uribismo and corruption (although in the past it seems like he mostly made videos about Venezuelan politics with a strong anti-Maduro angle). He is an evangelical Christian who was a right-winger and uribista until recently (he says he's a repented uribista) whose politics have shifted, seemingly because of what he considers Duque's broken promises (like tax reforms) and the protests. His social media-driven campaign used simple populist, anti-establishment rhetoric against corruption and corrupt traditional politicians. The self-proclaimed 'senator of the people' won 42.8k votes in his native department of Santander, and Rodolfo Hernández seems to have voted for him, and he now claims to be leader of the Greens (ugh). Normally I'd despair about YouTubers being elected anywhere, but given the sorts of literal criminals and murderers elected to Congress in Colombia in the past, I guess he's not so bad (still cringe, of course).

As I said, the YouTuber beat out de la Calle in terms of votes, although de la Calle still won a lot (187k). Ariel Ávila, a political scientist/researcher active in the media and online, won the third most votes on the list with 97.4k, much more than I expected, and more than incumbent Green senator Angélica Lozano. The results also showed the growing power of certain 'machines' or, at least, existing political structures/networks: Jairo Alberto Castellanos in Norte de Santander inherited the Cristo family's base (nationally he got 55.8k), former Caldas governor Guido Echeverri was elected with 53.5k votes and a strong result in Caldas and Carlos Amaya's candidate Ana Carolina Espitia was elected with 54.2k votes (and a very strong result in Boyacá, beating out the department's incumbent Green senators Sandra Ortiz and Jorge Londoño who both lost reelection). Two left-wing petrista Greens also made it in: Inti Asprilla (easily, with 82k) and León Fredy Muñoz (last one in, with less than a thousand vote difference with the 15th spot). Among notable defeats are incumbent senators Sandra Ortiz, Jorge Londoño, Antonio Sanguino and Iván Marulanda, Jorge Enrique Robledo's main candidate Jorge Gómez, Mockus' candidate Viviana Barberena, Ernesto Samper's son Miguel Samper and former Bogotá councillor Juan Carlos Flórez.

The Centro Democrático, as expected, suffered significant loses: it fell to just 11.9% and 14 seats (-5), and just 1.9 million votes, the party's worst result to date in the three senatorial elections it has participated in since 2014. It could have been even worse, I guess. To my surprise, Miguel Uribe Turbay, the top candidate, clearly beat María Fernanda Cabal, who had number 100, in their race to be the CD's most popular candidate: Uribe got 223.1k votes against 196.8k for Cabal (still a very good result for her), I guess I underestimated the legitimist tendencies of uribistas to vote for el que dice Uribe (especially when he uses his paternal surname in prominent position). Former Casanare governor Alirio Barrera won 103k, and over half of it came from outside Casanare. There were a few surprises, to me, as to who made it in and those who didn't: more little-known senators with strong-ish regional bases like Enrique Cabrales, Carlos Meisel, José Vicente Carreño, Honorio Henríquez Pinedo, Andrés Felipe Guerra, Esteban Quintero, Yenny Rozo and María Angélica Guerra (heir of the Guerra clan) won seats, while Santiago Valencia (incumbent senator and son of prominent former minister Fabio Valencia Cossio), Gabriel Velasco, Jonatan Tamayo 'Manguito' (the infamous nobody elected on Petro's list in 2018 who turned out to be a right-winger), Álvaro Hernán Prada (Álvaro Uribe's co-accused in the witness tampering case) and Edward Rodríguez (who did *very* badly - just 17.8k votes!). Tellingly, the more influencer/internet bubble-type candidates did terribly: DJ Andrés Motta won just 7,600 votes, homophobic YouTuber Oswaldo Ortíz just 6,000 and the uncle of vallenato star Silvestre Dangond just 4,900. Uribismo without Uribe looks even more like a traditional party, with its regional factions and structures.

Cambio Radical was another big loser: after its big success in 2018, it fell back to 11 seats (-5) and from 2.1 million to 1.6 million votes (or 9.9%). Charismo also came out disinflated from the elections. CR's top candidate (and Vargas Lleras ally) David Luna won the most votes (112.3k), beating out Arturo Char who won 102.1k, which is about 24,500 less than in 2018. Two charista candidates lost: Fabián Castillo (incumbent) and controversial Atlántico rep. César Lorduy (even though the latter had gotten the personal backing of Fuad Char, the patriarch), and only one other core charista won, incumbent senator Antonio Zabaraín (famous for his bizarre, incoherent, drunken/drugged up speech in Congress in 2018 which he blamed on a lack of oxygen in his brain), although other costeño charistas who are not part of the core family clan but allied to it did win, notably incumbent senator Ana María Castañeda. Incumbent senators from other political groups in CR also retained their seats, most notably Carlos Abraham Jiménez, who significantly increased his vote count, as well as Norte de Santander's Édgar Díaz. But, by and large, CR failed to make up for the loss of several of its senators (like Rodrigo Lara, the Aguilar clan or the MCI evangelicals). Besides Luna, all other 'opinion'-type candidates like Yefer Vega, former prosecutor Claudia Carrasquilla and Camilo Trujillo (the son of former uribista politician and cabinet minister Carlos Holmes Trujillo, who passed away in 2021) all lost: CR remains, by and large, a machine party. Other prominent losers included Temístocles Ortega, the 'electoral baron' of Cauca, who couldn't resist the Pacto's strong gains in the left-wing department and controversial four-term senator Daira Galvis from Bolívar (former lawyer of Enilce López 'La Gata', a gambling entrepreneur convicted of murder and parapolítica, she knocked at the JEP's door this year herself).

The Partido de la U, as expected, continued its slow decline: for the third election in a row, it has lost seats, now down another four to ten seats in the Senate, with its vote falling from 1.85 million to 1.5 million (or 9.3%). This was to be expected given the retiring or defected incumbents, so arguably the U did about as well as it could: its remaining machines still worked. First and foremost, the structures of its leader and top baroness, Dilian Francisca Toro, who despite loses in the Valle still elected two senators (and three reps), including the party's most voted candidate, Juan Carlos Garcés Rojas, who won 151.3k votes, as well as Norma Hurtado (third most votes with 128.1k). In Córdoba, some of its faction returned with more force: Johnny Besaile, brother of the infamous Musa Besaile (in jail for bringing judges in the 'cartel of the toga' scandal) and Edwin Besaile (former governor removed from office for embezzlement in the 'hemophilia cartel' scandal and involved in other corruption scandals to steal healthcare funds), was reelected with more votes than in 2018, 132.8k, while Julio Chagüi (husband of rep. Sara Piedrahita Lyons, the cousin of former corrupt thief/governor Alejandro Lyons, who set up the aforementioned corruption network) was also elected with 79.3 (on the other hand, the Ñoñomanía faction of corrupt former senator Bernardo 'el Ñoño' Elías, convicted in the Odebrecht scandal, again failed to return to the Senate: his brother Julio Elías Vidal lost). All senators elected are either incumbent or former congressmen (in either house), including strong incumbents like José David Name (of the Name clan of the Atlántico) and José Alfredo Gnecco (of the infamous Gnecco clan of Cesar), as well as others like La Guajira rep. Alfredo Deluque (who jumped from the House and gave the department a senator, for all the good that will do for the kids dying of malnutrition there [spoiler alert: it will do jacksh**t for them]) and the return of former senator Antonio Correa Jiménez (former senator for the defunct trash collector party Opción Ciudadana who is close to the 'La Gata' clan). Unsurprisingly, I guess, Catherine Ibargüen, the faux fresh face for the party, lost: she got just 42,700 votes.

The elections were actually very disappointing for the evangelicals MIRA and Colombia Justa Libres: whereas separately they had collectively elected 6 senators with over 900k votes in 2018, this year as a single coalition they fell to 591k (3.6%), barely passing the threshold to elect only four senators. It's interesting that three of the four senators are from the MIRA (Ana Paola Agudelo, Carlos Eduardo Guevara and Manuel Virgüez Piraquive), although the candidate who won the most votes, Lorena Ríos, is from CJL (she won 61.9k, the three MIRA candidates who won got between 50 and 58k each): it would suggest that the MIRA's more disciplined vote turned out better for the list, while divided CJL didn't 'put' as many votes. It hardly went any better for the evangelicals in the House: only one MIRA candidate was elected, in Bogotá, where the list only had enough votes for one seat (as opposed to the two they won separately in 2018).

Fuerza Ciudadana narrowly missed out on the threshold. As I wrote earlier, Petro was pissed at Carlos Caicedo's left-wing movement for depriving the Pacto of more seats by running its own separate open list. Fuerza Ciudadana got 439,596 votes (2.7%), about a fifth of them from Magdalena, where the list finished second with 17.2%. The party's top candidate, Gilberto Tobón (academic and political commentator on Twitter), won 173.5k votes (more than many senators-elect and probably a record for the most votes for a defeated candidate). Hollman Morris won only 9,500 (good riddance). On the other hand, Fuerza Ciudadana did win a seat in the House, in Magdalena of course.

The election was a real disappointment and disillusion for Nuevo Liberalismo. Clearly, the Galán name and logo isn't worth as much in 2022 as it was in the 1980s. The closed list won 329.7k, just 2%, quite a distance from the threshold, when a lot had expected them to do much better than that. It's telling that 45.5% of all its votes came from Bogotá, where it won 5.8% (and elected one representative). Moreover, even if all of Galán's 486.8 voters in the primary had voted for his party's list, they would still have not made it in. As I said, they'll retain their party status exceptionally even as they failed to meet the threshold, but it's really not a good start for them and they will need to rethink their strategies (perhaps listen to the criticisms of Nuevo Liberalismo veterans and others who have called the reborn party a Galán family clique). It's a bit of a pity because they really had some valuable candidates on their list, like Mabel Lara (especially when you see the kind of people elected on the Green/CE list...).

It also wasn't a great result for Estamos Listas, the feminist collective, who only got 0.7% (108.7k votes), although I guess 108k votes is not a terribly bad result for a new and unusual political movement which also never got the public funding it was entitled to...

It was an absolutely disastrous result for the ex-FARC Comunes who won only 31,100 votes, down from 52,500 votes in 2018 (already disastrous). They still get their 10 seats in Congress, but this is their last term with this benefit, so it really doesn't smell good for their long-term future after 2026...

The results at the bottom of the pack for the alvarista MSN and 'the witch' Regina 11's MUP - 29,100 and 12,500 votes only - show that 1990s politics are dead and buried in Colombia (and that alvarismo/laureanismo conservatism is nothing now).

After this, I'll try to make sense of the House results and have more details on that with some numbers as well. I might also take a look at key departmental results, which I kind of ignored here.

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I've made sense quickly of the House results (I haven't really looked at CITREP now) and rearranged the labels and local coalitions with their respective parties. The House looks something like this:

Liberals 33 seats (-2)
Conservatives 27 seats (+6)
Pacto Histórico 27 seats (+22)
Cambio Radical 18 seats (-12)
Centro Democrático 16 seats (-16)
Partido de la U 16 seats (-9)
Alianza Verde 15 seats (+5)
Centro Esperanza 2 seats (+2)^*
Nuevo Liberalismo 2 seats (+2)^*
Liga 2 seats (+2)
MIRA 1 seat (n/c)
Gente en Movimiento 1 seat (+1)
Colombia Renaciente 1 seat (+1)
Fuerza Ciudadana 1 seat (+1)
--
MAIS 1 seat (indigenous)
Afro seats 2 seats
Citrep 16 seats
Comunes 5 seats (n/c)

* one for Dignidad, one unknown (may have been formally endorsed by Green Oxygen)
* one elected for 'Juntos por Caldas' coalition (NL-ASI-Dignidad-MIRA), endorsed and claimed by Nuevo Liberalismo

The broad conclusions I made for the senatorial elections apply here, just perhaps further amplified by the electoral system and effects of district magnitude. The Pacto, Conservatives, Liberals and Greens are the main winners. The CD, CR and La U are the main losers.

I was surprised at how well the Pacto managed to do and how they were actually able to win seats in many departments with only a few representatives. The Pacto elected representatives in 13 departments and the international constituency. They're the second largest group in the House with the Conservatives (and ahead of them if you include the MAIS indigenous representative in their ranks). They won very impressive numbers in Bogotá (31.6% and 7 seats) and Valle (26.1% and 5 seats), doing better than I (and most others) expected. Even in Antioquia they won 11.3% and 2 seats. The funniest case is Santander, where there was a 'rogue' Pacto Histórico list with just one (nobody) candidate (after the Pacto had wanted to run a list with the Greens) and where Petro asked his voters to vote for the Green list there - well, the 'rogue' Pacto, still won 9.4% and 1 seat in Santander thanks to the logo! The Pacto also won the expat seat (international constituency) with 31.6% against 24.3% for the CD, defeating the trumpista-uribista MAGA incumbent Juan David Vélez - I'm so glad that the foaming at the mouth neo-fascist exiles in Miami will have a castrochavista congressman!

The Liberals did suffer some minor losses (and some gains elsewhere) but their victory is in remaining the single largest party in the House and with the broadest geographical representation - with seats in 27 departments. Again, a lot of that came the expense of ethics and ideological coherence, but that hardly matters. It's sad, for example, to see an quality congressman and actual progressive liberal like Juan Fernando Reyes Kuri lose his seat in the Valle while the Liberal representative with the most votes (nearly 88,000) is Jezmi Barraza (Atlántico), daughter of a local gamonal and allied with the criminal Pulgar clan. The good news is that the Liberals' only seat in Bogotá will still be held by Juan Carlos Lozada, an actual liberal, who beat the candidate of the MCI evangelical church/Castellanos family business.

The Conservatives made gains in the House as well, gaining 6 seats from the 2018 result. A lot of that was thanks to being even further strengthened in their current strongholds, like Bolívar where they achieved their goal of winning 4 seats (+2) with the strength of the Blel and Montes clans (two groups originally led by convicted parapolíticos), Tolima where they won 3 seats (+1) and Córdoba where they now have two seats (including David Barguil's cousin Nicolás, who won 88.9k votes). This made up for some losses elsewhere, like in the Valle and Huila, where they lost their only seats.

On the other hand, things weren't so good for Cambio Radical, which fell from 30 seats to just 18 seats now. They lost seats in Atlántico (where they won 3, down from 4), Bogotá (reduced to one, was to be expected with the loss of the MCI), Bolívar (lost both, one incumbent did jump to the Senate but Karen Cure, ally of the 'La Gata' criminal enterprise/clan and charismo), Boyacá, Caldas, Cesar, Cundinamarca, Magdalena, Santander, Sucre and Tolima. Some of these losses had to do with clans shifting their partisan labels (in Cesar, CR rep. Eloy 'Chichi' Quintero had his son elected as a Liberal, for example) or the weakening of the machines tied to CR in 2018 (like in Sucre, where they lost both seats). Unfortunately, in Bogotá, CR's seat was won by former city councillor Carolina Arbeláez rather than the incumbent José Daniel López, one of the few CR representatives who was worth a damn. On the plus side, CR's seat in the Valle didn't go to loudmouth far-right hysteric Juanita Cataño (who was proud of being called 'paraca').

The lower house was even more brutal for the Centro Democrático, which lost half of its seats. The uribista defeats came from many places: in Antioquia, where they held 7 seats, they lost two, they were wiped out in the three departments of the Eje Cafetero, in Bogotá they lost 3 seats (from 5 to 2) as they fell into third place, they lost both of their seats in Cundinamarca and even in the traditionally uribista Orinoquía/Llanos Orientales they lost seats in Arauca, Meta and Vichada. They did, however, win a seat in Magdalena for the first time (with the winner being a candidate backed by the powerful Dávila Abondano family of landowners/agroindustrialists). Unfortunately, Gabriel Santos, one of the few uribistas who stood out from the pack for reasons other than being hysterical/insane/crooked, didn't win reelection in Bogotá. The CD is now represented in only 11 departments of the country. Good news, however, in Santander: the CD lost a seat and Johanna Chaves (wife and intended heir of a corrupt former congressman), who got attention for a homophobic ad (saying 'if you want us to respect your choices, you must respect ours too!'), lost (unfortunately the other CD representative in Santander who did win reelection is not much better: also the heir of a corrupt ex-congressman).

The Partido de la U also slipped even further in the lower house, losing seats for the third election in a row. It lost its only seats in places like Antioquia, Atlántico, Caldas, Bolívar, Cauca, even in strongholds like Cesar, Córdoba and Valle it lost a seat. As with CR, some of these losses have to do with clans shifting their partisan labels like in Antioquia, Atlántico and Caldas. It was in Córdoba, nevertheless, that the country's second-most voted candidate was elected: former miss Córdoba Saray Elena Robayo, cousin of outgoing rep. Erasmo Zuleta and fórmula of the Besaile clan (Zuleta's sister is married to corrupt former governor Edwin Besaile), won 115,900 votes. Dilian Francisca Toro's strength remained obvious in the Valle: she elected three of her four candidates for the House, although the Pacto Histórico won a major victory in the department. As in the Senate, the Partido de la U's caucus is a who's who of some of the most awful and corrupt clans (like in Sucre, where ex-Opción Ciudadana incumbent Milene Jarava, wife of the very corrupt and controversial/professional vote buyer Yahir Acuña, was easily reelected with the U's blessing) and other machine politicians.

The Greens, who ran alone separately from the Centro Esperanza (or even in coalition with the Pacto in some places), were also among the winners in the House: including those Greens elected in coalition with the Pacto or other left-wing parties, they have 15 seats, up 5 from 2018. They are now represented in 10 departments, double the amount from 2018. They gained seats in departments where 'alternative' candidates did well in 2018-9, like Caldas (the winner is the cousin of the Green mayor of Manizales), Risaralda (winning two seats, in coalition with the Polo, with 18%) and Meta but also in other places like Tolima (in coalition with the Pacto: thankfully the Green candidate, who seems like a promising congresswoman, won, instead of the Pacto's candidate, who comes from a traditional political clan). In Antioquia, they picked up a second seat. The only weakness was Bogotá, where they lost a seat, although they still won 3 seats there. Incumbent Bogotá rep. Katherine Miranda became the most voted candidate in Colombia with 118.8k (a bit unfortunate as she's not particularly great and mostly enjoys going viral on social media for silly stuff). Unfortunately, incumbent rep. Mauricio Toro, a very good representative, lost his seat in Bogotá - and unfortunately it went to Olga Lucía Velásquez, a former Liberal congresswoman with past ties to the corrupt Moreno administration. I am glad that the Green seats in Santander and Valle went to good and promising candidates rather than less savoury candidates (like Ospina's candidates in Valle).

The Centro Esperanza, separate from the Greens, won two seats - one in Bogotá and one in Antioquia with 6.5% and 6.8% of the vote respectively. In Bogotá, student leader Jennifer Pedraza won the lone victory for Jorge Enrique Robledo's Dignidad, as she got about 600 more votes than Anastasia Rubio Betancourt (Ingrid Betancourt's young niece), and hopefully that doesn't change in the final count. In Antioquia, the seat went to former Medellín councillor Daniel Carvalho, who has Rasta dreadlocks (he was de la Calle's fórmula, and endorsed by Fajardo and his daughter). You can add a third seat if you count the seat won by a Nuevo Liberalismo-ASI-Dignidad-MIRA coalition in Caldas, but I have counted the winner with Nuevo Liberalismo, as he was endorsed by them and they have 'claimed' him. Elsewhere, the Centro Esperanza minus the Greens didn't do very well: 2.1% in Valle, 4% in Santander, 1.7% in Tolima, 2.4% in Cundinamarca...

The Nuevo Liberalismo kind of saved face by winning two seats in the House - one, as mentioned, through a coalition in Caldas. In Bogotá, they won 7.3% (ahead of the Liberals) and won one seat, which will be held by former National Parks director Julia Miranda.

Rodolfo Hernández's Liga confirmed its strength in Santander, the only place it ran, by topping the polls there with 20.8% and 166.9k votes (significantly more than the 80k its list for the departmental assembly won in 2019), getting two seats. In contradiction with what their leader preaches, both representatives-elect have recent and personal ties with the traditional politics that Rodolfo has branded as corrupt: the top candidate, Érika Tatiana Sánchez is the 'quota' of convicted (corrupt) former governor Mario Camacho (who is an old friend of Rodolfo) and outgoing Liberal representative Édgar 'el Pote' Gómez. As recently as 2019, she worked for the mayoral campaign of a candidate supported by traditional politicians who Rodolfo had called corrupt. The Liga's success (as well as that of the Greens and Pacto) in Santander cost two seats to the Liberals and a seat to CR and uribismo.

The lower house elections confirmed how this election was a real flop for the Christian evangelicals. In coalition with CJL, MIRA was only able to hold its lone seat in Bogotá - with 5% of the vote - while CJL didn't win anything. Separately, the two had won around 10% in 2018 and one seat each. In the Valle, which was low hanging fruit for them (especially by running united), they failed to win a seat.

Gente en Movimiento, the movement which topped the poll in Caldas with 15.8% (and 1 seat), is the new movement of former Partido de la U senator Mauricio Lizcano (the son of outgoing Partido de la U rep. Óscar Tulio Lizcano), a traditional politician (with his share of scandals and skeletons) who has tried to appear more 'alternative' since 2019 - Lizcano's faction allied with the Greens to win Manizales and the Caldas governorship in 2019.

Carlos Caicedo's Fuerza Ciudadana won a seat in Magdalena with 13.9% of the vote. The seat will go to Caicedo's former private secretary.

Colombia Renaciente, a party created by having won one of the Afro seats in 2018, professes to be all kinds of nice things. Unfortunately, its only representative, elected in La Guajira, is the cousin of convicted murderer and former governor Kiko Gómez. This is why you cannot trust minor parties in Colombia: when you're not looking, they give their endorsement to trash.

The Afro seats are, once again (as in 2010 and 2014, less so in 2018), a farce and freakshow. The first seat was won by a list which won 13.1% and it will go to Ana Monsalve, the sister of the mayor of Malambo (Atlántico), who beat Edison Massa, former mayoral candidate in Puerto Colombia (Atlántico) on the same list, to win the seat. Monsalve's brother was elected mayor of Malambo in 2019 with the support of Conservative senator Laureano Acuña, famous for buying votes and dancing shirtless and drunk, but seems to have betrayed him, so Ana Monsalve's candidacy was organized and supported by another powerful cacique, U senator José David Name (current leader of the old Name family) - as well as her brother's administration of course - while Acuña supported Massa (as he had in 2019). She won 21,500 of her 26,200 votes in Atlántico, giving her the seat. The other seat was won by controversial far-right uribista YouTuber/influencer Miguel Polo Polo, supported by CD senator María Fernanda Cabal. His closed list won 35,200 votes (7.4%), most of those votes came from major cities or even abroad, with the support of Cabal's far-right circles. Off to a great start, Polo Polo said that he won't defend Afro-Colombian communities' collective rights, that he ran for the Afro seat (much easier to win) because he felt like it and that anybody can be black if you perceive yourself as black (even, he said, his interviewer, who had "Aryan features"). A list led by Lina Martínez, the daughter of convicted parapolítico/former senator Juan Carlos Martínez, finished a close third. The list supported by Francia Márquez's movement unfortunately only finished fourth. As if all this nonsense wasn't bad enough, both movements behind the winners will automatically be legally recognized as parties and become coveted 'endorsement factories' in next year's local elections (and Cabal has a party waiting for her and her clique if the CD ends up imploding).

As a bonus, here's a map of the Senate election for each major list by department

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So there were major problems in the preconteo which greatly underreported the Pacto Histórico: I'll leave it up to you whether it's fraud, a perfect storm of human errors or incompetence. I'll just leave this classic quote though: never attribute to malice that which is adequately explained by stupidity. In any case, it's an extremely bad look for the credibility of the Registraduría and its already controversial head, Alexander Vega.

There have been widespread allegations of fraud, of votes appearing or disappearing out of thin air. The most serious irregularity is that there were about 28,500 mesas (individual voting tables) where no votes for the Pacto were registered in the preconteo, which is very atypical (the Conservatives, with a similar vote to them, had only 3,000 mesas with 0 votes). As Petro and others have explained, this seems to be due to a design flaw in the forms filled out by poll workers, called E-14. The Pacto, with a closed list, appeared at the very bottom of a E-14 sheet, almost as a footnote, below the 100 boxes for the U's open list, very easy to miss (again, either out of malice or incompetence or just oversight). Other parties, like the Greens, Fuerza Ciudadana and Nuevo Liberalismo also denounced that their votes were underreported or missing. Many parties on the left have called for a full recount and for Vega's resignation, while the right is coming up with conspiracy theories (demented old idiot Andrés Pastrana, who is full conspiranoid now, has indirectly blamed the Spanish PSOE and Podemos government)

The final count is ongoing but nearly finished for the Senate, and the Registraduría announced partial results of the final count with about 3,600 mesas left to count. The Pacto has gained 390,100 votes and 3 seats:

https://twitter.com/DiegoFuerteB/status/1504889393743548416
The seats gained by the Pacto would come at the expense of the Conservatives, Greens-CE and CD. The Pacto remains confident that it will gain a 20th seat when the count is finished -- they claim that they have 'gained' 460,000-500,000 votes.

It's very hard to get a clear grasp of what's going on and to weed out actual problems from political rhetoric (and sore losers). But even if it's not fraud it's clearly been a fiasco of epic proportions for the Registraduría and completely destroys trust and credibility in the country's electoral institutions, on all sides (the left will argue that their votes were stolen until they defended them, the right will argue that the left gained half a million votes out of thin air).

Unfortunately this also means that my own analysis is already outdated and I'll need to redo my maps. F)!(ck you, Vega!

In political news, Sergio Fajardo announced his running mate: former Chocó governor and environment minister Luis Gilberto Murillo, who dropped his own irrelevant presidential candidacy. It's honestly a very weak pick: yeah, Murillo is black and not a bad guy, and it kind of addresses the perception that the centrist coalition was a coalition of rich white men claiming to represent diversity but he doesn't bring any votes and doesn't add anything. It also seems as if he was kind of a plan B/C pick: Fajardo apparently offered it to Mabel Lara, who would have been a much better pick, but she refused. Francia Márquez also claims that his campaign offered it to her, but he's denied it and it's hard to believe his campaign would be so ignorant of basic legal impediments to even consider that. In any case, I'm not very impressed with Fajardo's campaign so far, post primary debacle.

Fajardo also met with Ingrid Betancourt earlier this week, but it doesn't seem as if she will drop out (yet). I'm also not sure how many votes she actually has and if it really matters for Fajardo that she drops out or not. Betancourt also made a really douchey and insensitive comment about Petro going through a deep depression in the 1990s.

The CD was not overly pleased with Zuluaga dropping out without bothering to tell anyone beforehand, because in doing that he kind of surrendered uribismo to Fico without getting anything in exchange and Fico got uribismo without even needing to ask for it. The best of both worlds for him. But I don't blame Zuluaga: you almost have to feel sorry for him, given how badly he was treated by his own party (for the second election in a row). The CD is kind of withholding its formal endorsement, but this could also be because Uribe is smart enough that Fico might not want the party's logo associated with him, given that formal endorsement by uribismo might not be a net positive (all he needs are its voters and he already has them) -- particularly as Fico's main challenge going into the real campaign is to fight off the idea that he's 'Duque 2'.

Also Vargas Lleras, to no-one's surprise after Sunday, confirmed he wouldn't run.

[icc]

Is there any chance of a full recount, or is this basically bluster from campaigns who know it won’t happen?

It sounded from an article on La Silla Vacía as though smaller parties like Nuevo Liberalismo may have lost out on a lot a votes too (which you can see in the figures posted), but aren’t getting them all, basically due to a lack of counting agents. Unfortunately something that will be a problem for small parties in all democracies. And admittedly, given how far off the threshold they were, it doesn’t make much difference.

Also a question - what is electioneering like in Colombia? Is there leafleting / doorknocking? Or is it a combination of the air war with, shall we say, questionable, practices?

Plus, out of interest, what are the issues you identified with Nuevo Liberalismo, and the way the Galáns have run it? From a look over their Senate and Bogotá lists, I thought the quality looked very good, not just by the rotten level of Colombian politics, but in terms of any centre-left party.

[Hash]

Is there any chance of a full recount, or is this basically bluster from campaigns who know it won’t happen?

It sounded from an article on La Silla Vacía as though smaller parties like Nuevo Liberalismo may have lost out on a lot a votes too (which you can see in the figures posted), but aren’t getting them all, basically due to a lack of counting agents. Unfortunately something that will be a problem for small parties in all democracies. And admittedly, given how far off the threshold they were, it doesn’t make much difference.

I don't think there's much of a chance of a full recount - it's unclear whether there's any legal framework or precedent for that, and while I don't understand the full details of what the escrutinio actually does, it kind of is a recount in its own way given that votes are recounted if there are inconsistencies between the different forms filled out (see this explanation) and it's a process overseen and certified by judges and it is the moment for parties to challenge results. But, of course, it's Colombia, so somebody will put in a tutela or some other legal challenge somewhere and some aspect of the electoral process will end up in the Council of State, which may or may not end up revising the results, as it did with 2014 election (in late 2017).

It's pretty bad that the pre-count was such a fiasco this year, but it is always made very clear that the pre-count is merely an informative procedure which has no legal value, and only the escrutinio has legal value. It seems as if the most egregious irregularities in the pre-count have been rectified in the escrutinio by now.

Also a question - what is electioneering like in Colombia? Is there leafleting / doorknocking? Or is it a combination of the air war with, shall we say, questionable, practices?

Electioneering depends on the candidate: Sergio Fajardo campaigns very differently from, say, Laureano Acuña in Atlántico, or even from Gustavo Petro. The 'traditional' way of presidential campaigning is to organize mass rallies and public events, 'filling up' the public squares across the country in a show of force. Petro is a master at doing this and it remains his preferred style of campaigning, but he's only continuing a campaigning tradition used by past politicians (like Gaitán or Luis Carlos Galán but also corrupt clientelist politicians). Doing this requires a campaign to have significant local infrastructure, organization and support - you need local politicians who are connected with local community organizers and 'leaders' to organize these events, bring people to these events (including paying or pressuring them to come, busing in your people and organizing for food etc.) or, alternatively, you need support from a local/regional government that will handle the logistics of organizing these mass events (which is technically illegal 'political participation') and supporting the candidate (often by pressuring civil servants and contractors to hand in sheets with information on 20-odd voters). It's certain (and proven) that many of Petro's mass rallies have been organized by local politicians and their machines (but also no denying that he gets spontaneous, genuine popular mobilization like Galán and Gaitán did in their days).

In other elections, these events are at a much smaller scale and more local in scope - filling community centres or organizing small meetings and rallies in rural veredas etc. - but I think it largely works the same way, through the support and organization of the machine's lowest echelons (so-called 'leaders', contractors, public servants, aldermen and councillors).

Since the 1990s, 'alternative' politicians in large, wealthier urban centres, starting with Bogotá, pioneered new styles of campaigning: leafleting at traffic lights, in the streets, in public spaces and on main avenues/roads, without organizing mass public rallies. That's how Mockus, Fajardo but also Fico won their local races (Peñalosa also campaigns this way, but he's almost always effectively been supported by parties and politicians with more traditional styles of campaigning). A lot of 'alternative' candidates have continued this campaigning strategy, and added to it - Fabián Díaz, who surprisingly won a seat in the House for the Greens-Polo in Santander in 2018 and was elected to the Senate this year, campaigned on stilts in 2018.

Compare, for example:

https://twitter.com/FicoGutierrez/status/1500311439843676165 and https://twitter.com/MiguelPintoH1/status/1500826085042364418

Now, more politicians are also increasingly using social media to win elections - it's now clear that all presidential candidates need a strong social media presence and there is active competition for viral buzz, followers, likes, retweets etc. among politicians. To the point that there have been famous 'scandals' about politicians (both Petro and Fico, for example) having fake followers or armies of paid followers and community managers whose job it is to amplify internet trends in a politician's favour. And, I guess, this year we can say that Jota Pe Hernández is the first congressman elected thanks to social media?

Air wars and coverage in more traditional/mainstream media is also still very important, as elsewhere. There are cases of politicians paying for favourable press coverage, and also journalists seeking out politicians offering favourable press coverage in exchange for money. Once elected, politicians who are good communicators will also pay attention to getting good publicity: Fico was a master at this while he was mayor of Medellín, investing a ton of public money in vain self-promotion, like a weekly program of his own the city's public TV channel, and making sure a lot of his actions as mayor were tailored for good media consumption. During campaigns, there's also a competition to get publicity with your billboards or campaign ads, and unfortunately it's really a race to the bottom, since each year (especially in local elections with council and JAL candidates) you get a bunch of idiots using dumb ads to go viral. In this election there was a lot of attention (too much, probably) paid to the billboards put up by Katherine Miranda or Juanita Cataño (it worked out very well for the former, but not for the latter).

And, of course, there are loads of questionable practices involved in campaigning, even ignoring vote buying and E-Day behaviour. As in other Latin American countries, government welfare/benefits programs are used, for example by spreading word that you need to vote for candidate x to retain your benefits or spreading fake rumours that the other candidates will abolish the program and take away your benefits if elected (this is what Santos' campaign did to Mockus in 2010). Or the old 'TLC' (tiles, bricks and cement) strategy of 'neighbourhood clientelism', created by Roberto Gerlein in Barranquilla.

Also, out of interest, what are the issues you identified with Nuevo Liberalismo, and the way the Galáns have run it? From a look over their Senate and Bogotá lists, I thought the quality looked very good, not just by the rotten level of Colombian politics, but in terms of any centre-left party.

Oh, for sure, the Nuevo Liberalismo did run a lot of quality candidates and it's a shame that they didn't make it.

The main criticism towards it is that it really looks like the new party has been run like a Galán family business. Iván Marulanda, a veteran of the movement, changed his mind about rejoining the party last December, with strong criticisms about the ConCourt's sentence (which temporarily handed over leadership of the party to two little-known figures, which Marulanda didn't recognize as legitimate and who he claimed wanted to turn the party into a closed 'pocket party') but also with thinly-veiled accusations that the Galán brothers were turning it into a family party. Then there was the case of Rodrigo Lara who tried, unsuccessfully, to be a presidential pre-candidate for the party and it always seemed clear that Galán had no interest in making room for him and no real interest in allowing him to compete for the party's candidacy (even if the party could have had two candidates in the primary, Galán only wanted a single candidate in the primary), which naturally led to Lara complaining publicly about how he was not allowed to compete in equal conditions and criticizing the Galán for behaving like a political clan. Of course, Lara is kind of an opportunist and, unlike Carlos Fernando Galán, he never seemed really ill at ease with some of the more questionable members and allies of CR, but still.

By insisting on running separate lists from the rest of the coalition, it also raised real questions about how much of a 'team player' Galán really was in the centrist coalition and to what extent he was truly committed to the coalition as a collective project to govern together, rather than as a means to raise his party's profile or to boost his brother's mayoral campaign in Bogotá next year.

Then there is also the unfortunate reality that it's very difficult for a new party, with much fewer resources/money and not many veteran old-timey politicians, relying exclusively on the voto de opinión (and with a closed list), to do well in a national congressional election. Peñalosa and Mockus in 2006 and Fajardo in 2010 both tried to take their movements national, but both failed for similar reasons. Arguably, Nuevo Liberalismo could have done better (and gotten a seat or two in the Senate) if it had been less stubborn and accepted to be on a common, open list with the rest of the Centro Esperanza.

[icc]

Thanks, super informative!

[Hash]

Things have somehow managed to take a turn for the ridiculous.

The right, led by Álvaro Uribe and Andrés Pastrana (who is now a crazy conspiracy theorist), have adopted wholesale the narrative of fraud and refusing to recognize the election results. Yes, there definitely was fraud against a governing party whose only real accomplishment since 2018 has been filling nearly all institutions, from the Fiscalía onwards, with Duque's incompetent friends. Also, didn't the Colombian right always say that Colombia had the oldest democracy in Latin America or something? The left, which up until the election was saying that there was no real democracy or guarantees, are now the ones calling on all parties to reject Uribe's coup invitation and defend democracy. The centre, lost as always, is doing some tedious 'bOtH sIdEs' false equivalence routine, and while they're not entirely wrong, it's ridiculous to draw comparisons between Petro/the Pacto's quite legitimate complaints about the election numbers and the far-right veering off into conspiracy theories and Trumpian playbook stuff. Uribe going off into Trumpian fraud rhetoric is nothing new or too surprising: he's shown over his entire career that he has no respect for any democratic institutions when they dare to go against him, and he has always suggested dangerous (chavista) authoritarian responses whenever some institution does something he doesn't like.

Also, I just love that the main theorist of fraud conspiracies is Andrés Pastrana, whose father was elected in a very much fraudulent election, perhaps the most fraudulent and controversial election ever, in 1970.

Today, the incompetent national registrar, Alexander Vega, announced that he will request a full national recount of all votes for the Senate. It seems as if he can't order that, so it will need to be approved by the CNE, which has somehow managed to be more competent and credible than Vega, which is quite a feat considering that the CNE is useless. Vega did this after Duque asked for a recount, a day before Duque convenes whatever the hell the 'national commission on electoral guarantees' is. Somehow, Vega announced this without also announcing his resignation at the same time.

edit: Now Petro is rejecting the recount, saying that this is fraud because the chain of custody of the votes is broken since the escrutinio is finished in most places and that there is no transparency or guarantees anymore. He's suspending his participation in debates until the 'transparency of the vote' is guaranteed.

I really hope this recount is transparent and gives similar results to the escrutinio, or else stuff will get even more dangerous.

In other news, the first post-primaries poll has come out, by CNC (one of the best pollsters) for Semana (now fully transformed into a useless right-wing rag): Petro has 32% followed by Fico with 23%, with Rodolfo and Fajardo tied for distant third at 10% each. Blank votes, undecideds and no answer add up to 20%. Semana is now, of course, desperately hyping up Fico and painting a 'Petro vs. Fico' narrative. Just like they hyped up Rodolfo back in November.

[xelas81]

Implication being that Pacto rigged the vote just to get less than 15% of vote in the Senate?

[Sadader]

This is an excellent thread, thank you for doing it.

I'm starting to think that Fico will take this, between today's YanHass poll and last week's Semana poll. Though if in the runoff Fico takes 90% of Hernandez, 70% of Fajardo, 10% of Betancourt, and 50% of undecideds it only gives him 50.3% in the Semana case and 46.6% in the YanHass case.

Poller	Petro	Fico	Fajardo	Hernandez	Betancourt	Undecided/Other
Semana	32	23	10	10	3	22
YanHass	37	19	10	11	2	21