Presidency of Luis Lacalle Pou

Presidency of Luis Lacalle Pou 1 March 2020 – present
President	Luis Lacalle Pou
Cabinet	See list
Party	National
Election	2019
Seat	Executive Tower
← Tabaré Vázquez

This article is part of a series about Luis Lacalle Pou
Political career President of Uruguay (2020–present) Senator of the Republic (2015–2019) National Representative (2000–2015) Presidency Inauguration Cabinet Official trips Popularity COVID-19 pandemic vaccinations Caso Astesiano [es] Caso Marset [es] 2022 heat wave Law of Urgent Consideration Drought Elections 2014 (campaign) 2019 (campaign) Family Luis Alberto Lacalle Julia Pou Media gallery
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The presidency of Luis Lacalle Pou began on 1 March 2020 when he was inaugurated as the 42nd president of Uruguay. Lacalle Pou, a member of the National Party took office following his victory over the Broad Front nominee Daniel Martínez in the second round of the 2019 general election, which ended the 15-year leftist rule in the country and the return of National Party to the Executive since his own father was the president in 1990–1995.^[1][2] On 16 December 2019, after his victory in the second round and before his inauguration, he announced his cabinet consisting of leaders of National, Colorado, Cabildo Abierto and Independent parties, members of the Multicolor Coalition.

Lacalle entered office just days before the outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic, which dominated most of the political agenda during the first two years of his presidency.^[3] Within the first 100 days, his administration sent a bill to the General Assembly under the label of "Urgent Consideration Law", and after being approved within certain constitutional deadlines, it introduced a series of significant reforms in areas such as public security and criminal law, economic and fiscal policy, and labor and environmental law.^[4] In March 2022, almost halfway through Lacalle's term, after an opposition campaign, the electorate was asked in a referendum whether 135 articles of this law should be repealed.^[5]

The Lacalle administration carried out a reform of the educational system and the retirement and pension law.^[6] In March 2020, "Operation Safe Border" was launched in which thousands of troops from the three branches of the Armed Forces were deployed in the border areas with Brazil and Argentina to combat insecurity, smuggling and drug trafficking.^[7] The foreign policy objective of the Lacalle administration is to achieve greater flexibility in the rules of the Southern Common Market to trade outside the bloc and expand the free trade area, which has caused strain within the organization towards its neighbouring countries.^[8] Lacalle condemned the Russian invasion of Ukraine and Hamas as terrorism during the Israel–Hamas war, as well as accused Nicolás Maduro, Daniel Ortega and Miguel Díaz-Canel of leading dictatorial governments in their respective countries.^[9][10]

During the drought that occurred between 2022 and 2023, Lacalle declared a state of "water emergency" on June 19, 2023 and tax exemptions for bottled water, as well as the construction of a new reservoir and pipeline for water transfer in the San José River.^[11] Controversies in Lacalle administration include the Astesiano Case, in which Alejandro Astesiano, former chief custodian, who was dismissed from his position and subsequently arrested for forging Uruguayan identity cards and passports to Russian citizens.^[12]