After weeks of reviewing contested ballots, protests, and accusations of fraud in a razor-thin race, conservative Keiko Fujimori was officially declared the winner of Peru’s presidential race by the country’s electoral office on Friday.
Fujimori’s Victory
Fujimori won 50.135% of the vote in the June 7 runoff to clinch the nation’s top office in her fourth run for the presidency, just ahead of leftist Senator Roberto Sanchez’s 49.865%, a difference of just about 50,000 votes out of 18 million.
The slim margin is a reversal from the narrow loss Fujimori suffered in 2021, when she lost by about 45,000 votes to former leftist President Pedro Castillo. Castillo was impeached and jailed for trying to dissolve Congress in 2022.
Sanchez was seen as Castillo’s political heir and has said he will not recognize Fujimori’s government after claiming, without providing evidence, electoral fraud. Sanchez, boosted by voters from Peru’s rural regions, led the race earlier in the count and also won votes cast within the country by a slim margin.
International Reaction
Fujimori’s win reaffirms Latin America’s rightward shift, and other conservative leaders in the region including Argentina’s Javier Milei, Chile’s Jose Antonio Kast, and El Salvador’s Nayib Bukele have already congratulated the president-elect.
U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio also congratulated Fujimori in a statement, saying that the administration looks forward to deepening cooperation on security, investment, and trade.
Original reporting: Appleton, WI News Feed (HLL/CB) — read the source article.
