Costa Ricans are voting for president amid soaring drug violence that has shocked a country historically known as a peaceful tourist haven in a turbulent region.

Ruling party candidate Laura Fernández, who served as chief of staff for President Rodrigo Chaves, leads polls by a wide margin as voters back her hard line on crime.

Fernández, of the conservative Sovereign People’s Party, has pledged harsher sentences for gang members and favors suspending constitutional rights in high-crime neighborhoods to make it easier for police to conduct searches and arrests. She also promised a judicial reform and term limits on judges, who she says are soft on criminals.

Costa Rica’s location and ports have made it attractive to cocaine traffickers, who can hide the drug in cargoes of fruit destined for the U.S. and Europe. The number of murders surged to the highest ever in 2023 and has remained near that peak as rival gangs fought for territory, while the government seized a near-record 51 tons of cocaine last year.

“I will apply tough measures that allow us to take these criminals out of circulation and put them where they belong, in jail,” Fernández said during the campaign.

Leaders from the key tourism sector, which employs hundreds of thousands of Costa Ricans, have warned that rising crime threatens the country’s reputation as one of the safest destinations in Latin America. Foreign tourist visits remain below their pre-pandemic peak. Voters say crime is their top concern.

Fernández leads polls with 44% to roughly 9% for her nearest rival, Álvaro Ramos, in a field of 20 candidates. About a quarter of voters said they were still undecided the week before the election. A runoff between the top two candidates will be held in April if no one wins at least 40% of Sunday’s vote.

Polls are open from 6 a.m. to 6 p.m. local time, with results expected later that evening. The country is also electing all 57 members of its unicameral congress. The next president will be sworn in on May 8.

Fernández has called for closer economic ties with the U.S., says she opposes all new taxes and wants to “cut the fat” off the state. She’s also proposed selling two state-owned banks.

Ramos has pledged 6,000 new police officers, new jails and large-scale police operations in crime-prone neighborhoods and tourist areas. He called for relaxing the country’s fiscal deficit limits to allow more spending on education, and thinks the central bank should have a “dual mandate” to target growth as well as inflation.

He also promised to unfreeze salaries for public employees.

President Chaves is not eligible for reelection, but Fernández has floated the idea of naming Chaves him chief of staff.

Fernández also promised greater cooperation with the DEA and FBI to crack down on drug trafficking. Last year, she met Secretary of State Marco Rubio to discuss how to curb the flow of drugs to the U.S.

The economy will expand 3.6% this year, making it among the top performers in the Americas, according to analysts surveyed by Bloomberg.

Annual inflation is negative, and the unemployment rate is near its the lowest levels since 2007. The country’s currency rallied to a 20-year high in January.

Chaves, a former World Bank economist, completed a lending program with the International Monetary Fund, narrowed the country’s fiscal deficit and lowered public debt levels as a proportion of GDP.

_____

©2026 Bloomberg L.P. Visit bloomberg.com. Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.