- Born:
- October 7, 1958, Montevideo, Uruguay (age 68)
- Title / Office:
- president (2024-), Guatemala
- Notable Family Members:
- father Juan José Arévalo
Bernardo Arévalo
Bernardo Arévalo (born October 7, 1958, Montevideo, Uruguay) is a Guatemalan politician, diplomat, and sociologist who was sworn into office as president of Guatemala on January 15, 2024. A leader of the reformist Seed Movement (Movimiento Semilla), Arévalo rose to national prominence on an anti-corruption platform and won an unexpected victory in Guatemala’s 2023 presidential election. His election was followed by months of legal and political efforts to prevent his party from taking power. He is the son of former Guatemalan president Juan José Arévalo, who became the country’s first democratically elected president in 1945.
Early life and career
Arévalo was born in Uruguay while his father was living in political exile following the 1954 CIA-backed coup that ousted his successor, Pres. Jacobo Árbenz. Arévalo lived in Uruguay until he was two years old and subsequently lived with his family in Mexico and Chile. At age 15 he moved to Guatemala, where he completed his secondary education at Liceo Guatemala. As the child of Guatemalan parents, Arévalo held Guatemalan citizenship despite having been born abroad, which later made him eligible to run for president.
Before entering politics, Arévalo received a Bachelor of Arts in sociology from the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. He then went on to obtain a doctoral degree in philosophy and social anthropology from Utrecht University in the Netherlands. After completing his studies, he began his professional career in Guatemala’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs. From 1984 to 1988 he served in several positions at the Guatemalan embassy in Israel, including first secretary, consul, and minister-counselor. After returning to Guatemala, he became deputy director of strategic studies and planning in 1989 and subsequently held senior positions overseeing bilateral, economic, and multilateral foreign relations.
In 1994 Arévalo was appointed deputy minister of foreign affairs under Guatemalan Pres. Ramiro de León Carpio. The following year, he was appointed Guatemala’s ambassador to Spain, a position he held until 1996. Shortly thereafter, Arévalo became involved in academic and peace-building organizations. He served on the board of directors and later as president of the Center for Regional Research of Mesoamerica and, beginning in 1999, worked with the international peace-building organization Interpeace. He also advised organizations including the United Nations and the United States Institute of Peace.
Entry into politics and the Seed Movement
Arévalo entered politics in the aftermath of the 2015 anti-corruption protests known as the “Guatemalan Spring.” The demonstrations were sparked by revelations of a widespread customs fraud scheme and ultimately led to the resignation of Pres. Otto Pérez Molina and Vice Pres. Roxana Baldetti, both of whom were later convicted on corruption charges. The protests spurred calls for broader political reform and helped give rise to the Seed Movement (Movimiento Semilla), an organization cofounded by Arévalo that later became a political party centered on combating corruption and strengthening democratic institutions.
The political momentum for reform initially continued with the election of Jimmy Morales later that year. A television comedian and political outsider, Morales campaigned against corruption and presented himself as an alternative to Guatemala’s political establishment. However, after he won the presidency, his administration later came into conflict with the institutions leading the country’s anti-corruption efforts. In 2019 his government ended the mandate of the United Nations-backed International Commission Against Impunity in Guatemala (Comisión Internacional contra la Impunidad en Guatemala; CICIG), which had worked with Guatemalan prosecutors to investigate corruption and organized crime.
Against this backdrop, Semilla became a political party about 2018 and participated in its first general election the following year. Semilla initially nominated former attorney general Thelma Aldana for president, but electoral authorities barred her candidacy. Arévalo ran for Congress and won a seat in the national legislature. In Congress Arévalo emerged as one of Semilla’s leading figures and served as head of the party’s legislative bloc from 2020 to 2022. He served on committees dealing with foreign relations, human rights, national security, and national defense and continued to advocate for government transparency and institutional reform. His growing leadership within Semilla eventually positioned him for a national campaign, and in 2023 the party selected him as its presidential candidate.
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2023 presidential election
In January 2023 Arévalo announced his candidacy for president as Semilla’s nominee, with academic and biochemist Karin Herrera as his vice-presidential running mate. Their campaign focused on combating corruption and insecurity, creating jobs, and strengthening public institutions. Arévalo was considered a long-shot candidate but surprised observers by finishing second in the first round of voting in June, advancing to a runoff against former first lady Sandra Torres of the National Unity of Hope party (Unidad Nacional de la Esperanza; UNE). His unexpected success was followed by efforts to challenge the election results and the legal status of his party. Several political parties sought a review of the first-round vote, but the results were upheld. In July prosecutors led by Attorney General María Consuelo Porras and Rafael Curruchiche, head of the Special Prosecutor’s Office Against Impunity, sought to suspend Semilla over alleged irregularities in signatures collected when the movement registered as a political party. The Constitutional Court issued an injunction allowing Semilla to continue participating in the election.
The runoff took place on August 20, 2023. Arévalo defeated Torres by a wide margin, receiving about 58 percent of the vote compared with about 37 percent for Torres. His victory represented a major electoral breakthrough for the anti-corruption movement that had emerged from the protests of 2015. Legal challenges to Semilla continued after the election. Prosecutors pursued cases against the party and electoral officials, prompting widespread demonstrations and international concern about whether the election results would be respected. Indigenous leaders played a prominent role in protests demanding the resignation of Porras and the peaceful transfer of power to Arévalo.
Presidency
The political struggle continued through Arévalo’s inauguration. His swearing-in, scheduled for January 14, 2024, was delayed for hours amid disputes in Congress over the seating of legislators and the status of Semilla. Arévalo was ultimately sworn in shortly after midnight on January 15, with Herrera becoming vice president. Arévalo entered office promising to combat corruption, strengthen democratic institutions, improve public services, and expand economic opportunities. His ability to advance that agenda was limited by opposition in Congress and other state institutions. One of the defining conflicts of his early presidency was with Attorney General Porras, whose Public Ministry had pursued investigations against Semilla before and after the 2023 election. Arévalo repeatedly called for Porras to resign, but the attorney general headed an independent institution and he could not remove her from office at will.
His administration also pursued increased public investment in infrastructure and social programs while confronting long-standing problems including poverty, inequality, crime, and migration. The government promoted projects involving roads, ports, rail transportation, and the modernization of La Aurora International Airport, as well as plans for a metropolitan rail system in Guatemala City. A significant change came at the end of Porras’s term in May 2026, when Arévalo appointed lawyer Gabriel Estuardo García Luna as attorney general for the 2026–30 term. García Luna pledged to restore independence and public confidence in the Public Ministry and began reviewing cases involving officials, journalists, and others who alleged that they had been politically persecuted under the previous administration. The change marked an important development for Arévalo’s anti-corruption agenda after years of conflict between his political movement and the country’s prosecutorial authorities.