Abelardo de la Espriella is sworn in today, August 7, as Colombia's president in a ceremony unfolding roughly 300 miles from the presidential palace he has already said he'll turn into a museum. Instead of Bogotá's Plaza de Bolívar, the 47-year-old former criminal defense lawyer takes his oath at a university arena in Cali, marking the first time in over a century that a Colombian presidential transfer of power has taken place outside the capital. Vice President-elect José Manuel Restrepo is sworn in immediately afterward, in the same session. It's a fitting opening scene for a president who spent his campaign promising to tear up the playbook of his predecessor, Gustavo Petro, from the moment he takes the sash.
