Rafael López Aliaga, the 64-year-old mayor of Lima, has never shied away from controversy—or the limelight. Known to many as “Porky,” a nickname he’s embraced due to his resemblance to the cartoon character Porky Pig, López Aliaga is now preparing to leap from the capital’s ornate municipal palace onto the national stage. The conservative businessman and Opus Dei member has declared himself a follower of President Trump and is set to announce his candidacy for Peru’s presidency in the April 2026 election, according to The New York Times.
López Aliaga’s rise comes at a time when right-wing populism is making waves across Latin America, with figures such as Argentina’s Javier Milei and Brazil’s former president Jair Bolsonaro dominating headlines. López Aliaga, though perhaps less internationally known, appears eager to join their ranks—aligning himself closely with the MAGA movement and its global offshoots. Last year, he spoke at a Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) event in Argentina, and in January 2025, he snapped selfies at Trump’s inauguration. Just this past Saturday, he organized a memorial in Lima for Charlie Kirk, the slain American conservative activist—though, as The New York Times noted, some attendees admitted they’d never even heard of Kirk.
It’s not just his political alliances that set López Aliaga apart. As a devout member of Opus Dei, he claims to practice celibacy and weaves his religious convictions into his political rhetoric. He’s built a reputation as a combative, hyperbolic figure—one who dominates headlines even as he rails against the media. Supporters see him as a man of action, striving to improve life for Lima’s ten million residents—nearly a third of Peru’s population. Critics, however, paint him as an incompetent tyrant, quick to conflate fact and fiction and prone to conspiracy theories that resonate with an electorate increasingly distrustful of institutions.
“At least he’s trying,” Edison Mejía, a 31-year-old artist, told The New York Times. “Lima needs public works. Other politicians don’t care. They don’t mind making a fat salary while everything stays the same.” López Aliaga’s tenure as mayor has been marked by ambitious infrastructure projects, including the expansion of roads and railways in the notoriously traffic-choked city.
Yet, his vision for Peru goes far beyond city limits. Looking ahead to the presidency, López Aliaga has called for eliminating most government ministries, sending dangerous prisoners to El Salvador, ramping up military presence on Peru’s borders, and ordering military courts to try what he calls “urban terrorists.” He’s also voiced support for U.S. military actions—specifically, the bombing of boats in the Caribbean that Trump accused of carrying drugs—and has advocated for closer ties with Washington to “balance the equation” with China, Peru’s largest trading partner.
“I admire Trump for what he’s doing,” López Aliaga said in an interview with The New York Times. “He speaks clearly, doesn’t lie to you and does what he says quickly.” The similarities between the two men extend beyond policy. López Aliaga, much like Trump, oscillates between humor and vitriol—one moment expressing love, the next railing against the “parasites” and “specimens” he claims are holding Peru back.
His rhetoric can be incendiary. In 2021, he called for the “death” of two leftist politicians and told an advocate of physician-assisted dying to “jump off a building.” Just a day before Charlie Kirk was killed, López Aliaga declared that investigative journalist Gustavo Gorriti needed to be “eliminated once and for all.” He later clarified that he meant Gorriti should be put on trial, accusing the journalist—whose outlet, IDL-Reporteros, has investigated the mayor’s business dealings—of acting like “the king of Peru.” Gorriti, for his part, told The New York Times that López Aliaga’s attacks reflect a “neo-fascist playbook,” adding, “This whole idea of a global conspiracy involving dark, mysterious forces, it’s very old. It’s a paranoid vision of the far right, applied here.”
The term “caviar” has become López Aliaga’s weapon of choice—a Spanish reference to progressive elites he accuses of conspiring to keep Peru poor. “They benefit from people suffering, from people being miserable, because that public votes for them,” he insisted. “If someone leaves poverty, stops suffering, they forget the left.” Political scientist Eduardo Dargent, author of the book Caviar, explained to The New York Times that the label is now hurled by both the far right and far left to discredit progressives and centrists: “It’s the populist need to have a great enemy,” he said, noting López Aliaga’s desire to “defend Peru from that great enemy.”
But as Peru’s political scene heats up, the country’s challenges are mirrored—and sometimes magnified—on the global stage. Across the Americas and beyond, political and business elites are coming under scrutiny for alleged corruption, self-dealing, and the blurring of lines between public office and private gain. According to Fresh Hell, President Trump’s net worth has nearly doubled in the eight months since he returned to the Oval Office in February 2025. In May, the United Arab Emirates’ ruling family deposited $2 billion into a crypto fund co-founded by Eric and Donald Trump Jr., alongside associates with ties to the White House. Two weeks later, the administration granted the UAE access to highly advanced artificial intelligence computer chips—despite national security concerns that the technology could end up in the hands of China. The New York Times described the deal as “eviscerating the boundary between private enterprise and government policy in a manner without precedent in modern American history.”
Meanwhile, the American public’s response to such revelations has been tepid at best. Despite investigative reports by The New York Times, The New Yorker, and The Atlantic detailing Trump’s business entanglements and alleged corruption, apathy reigns. Only the most visual scandals—like the infamous gold bars found in Senator Robert Menendez’s closet—seem to break through the noise. The rest, as Fresh Hell laments, is drowned out by the “tabloid rhythms of TikTok dross” and a culture obsessed with wealth and spectacle.
Even the entertainment world is not immune to moral contradictions. This year, American comedians including Kevin Hart, Aziz Ansari, and Pete Davidson performed at the Riyadh Comedy Festival in Saudi Arabia—a country that has executed over 283 people so far in 2025. Comedian David Cross publicly criticized his peers for performing in a nation notorious for human rights abuses, highlighting the tension between free speech and profit. “I am disgusted, and deeply disappointed in this whole gross thing,” Cross wrote on X (formerly Twitter). “All of your bitching about ‘cancel culture’ and ‘freedom of speech’ and all that shit?... You don’t get to talk about it ever again.”
Back in Peru, López Aliaga’s own business dealings have attracted scrutiny. Public prosecutors are investigating possible financial crimes involving companies linked to the mayor, as reported by The New York Times. Yet, for many of his supporters, these allegations pale in comparison to their desire for change—however brash or unconventional the messenger.
As the world watches Peru’s political landscape shift and global norms of accountability continue to erode, one thing is clear: the lines between power, profit, and principle are blurrier than ever. Whether voters will reward or reject leaders like López Aliaga remains to be seen—but for now, the spectacle continues, both in Lima and far beyond.
