I met the “poorest president in the world” in late 2023. I had seen him before, at an event in Washington, DC, ten years earlier, but at that time, he was surrounded by wild throngs of adulators — shaking hands, snapping selfies, kissing babies. You might have thought he was a pop-star influencer rather than a man pushing eighty and the sitting president of a small, far-flung South American country. But this was the allure of Pepe: ex–guerrilla fighter, political prisoner turned president, viral phenomenon, philosopher, farmer, survivor.

When I finally had a chance to talk with José “Pepe” Mujica in person, he was no longer the president of Uruguay and had recently resigned from his seat in the country’s Senate due to declining health. We met at El Quincho de Varela, a modest straw-roofed room built around a barbecue, just down the road from his farm. Over the years, it had become hallowed ground, drawing politicians, activists, celebrities, and thinkers from Angela Davis to Brazilian president Lula da Silva. Walking in felt like arriving at a hermit’s retreat in the mountains. We talked about the state of social movements in the United States and our place in the longue durée of history. Even though he had stepped away from public life, Pepe was still curious about social movements abroad and open to being introduced to new ideas.

It is easy to see why Mujica was the source of endless fascination. After becoming head of state in 2009, he refused to move into the presidential palace, instead opting to stay in his ramshackle three-room farmhouse on the edge of Montevideo — guarded only by two cops and his three-legged dog, Manuela. He kept tending to his flower farm, drove himself to work in a powder-blue 1987 VW Beetle, gave away 90 percent of his salary to charity, and kicked off his term with less than $2,000 to his name. This lack of pretension and materialism gave him a global reputation as the most modest head of state one could find.