It has been a tumultuous few days in Honduras. Since voting in elections on Sunday, former president Juan Orlando Hernández—convicted last year of drug trafficking and bribery—was pardoned by [7] the Trump administration and subsequently released. The country has remained on tenterhooks as the results of its recent presidential election have still not yet been finalized, and Trump has threatened reprisals [6] if his favored candidate fails to win. Adding to the unease is the country's deeply flawed vote-transmission system, which has crashed twice [8].
The repeated failures of [10] the website set up by Honduran electoral authorities to publish vote tallies have enabled political leaders from across the spectrum to cast doubt on the results. Nevertheless, though the count is ongoing, some results are clear. The left-wing candidate of the ruling LIBRE party, Rixi Moncada, was defeated by a wide margin, even though the party claimed victory [11] late Sunday based on faulty polling. It is also clear that the next president—and the majority of [12] Congress—will be right-wing, though who will lead the country is still up in the air. The battle is between Salvador Nasralla, a well-known public figure who has run for president several times and served as vice president from 2022-2024, and Nasry "Tito" Asfura, the former mayor of Tegucigalpa who received explicit backing [13] from Trump. The two have traded razor-thin leads since Sunday: Asfura initially held a narrow lead, but after the first system crash, Nasralla narrowly pulled ahead. By Thursday, after another crash [14] and with more than 80 percent of the votes counted, Asfura was back on top prompting accusations of fraud [15] from Nasralla.
Trump has also alleged fraud, accusing Honduran electoral authorities [16] of "trying to change the results" after Monday's "technical tie." This was far from his only intervention in the electoral process. In the lead-up to the vote, Trump publicly endorsed [17] Asfura, threatened to withhold U.S. aid [18] if he lost, and labelled Nasralla [19] a "communist," even though he is running on a hard-line security agenda inspired by [20] Salvadoran President Nayib Bukele.
These maneuvers paled in comparison, however, to Trump's most egregious move: the shocking pardon of Hernández, known by his initials JOH. JOH was extradited to [21] the United States in 2022 and sentenced in 2024 to [22] 45 years in prison for taking bribes [23] from drug traffickers in exchange for facilitating the transit of hundreds of tons [24] of cocaine. Prosecutors argued that virtually his entire political career—from his time as a lawmaker to his rise to power in 2013, made possible by a U.S.-backed coup [25] in 2009—was fueled by drug money. Though he cast himself as [26] a reliable partner in the U.S. war on drugs and migrants [27], and enjoyed the support of [28] presidents Obama, Biden, and Trump, the facade crumbled after his brother's 2018 arrest [29] in Miami on drug trafficking and weapons charges. Hondurans, fed up with his fraudulent [30] 2017 reelection and pervasive corruption, elected left-wing candidate Xiomara Castro in 2021 and shipped JOH off to the United States the following year.
The pardon, which was granted [31] after Hernandez claimed persecution by the Biden administration, was particularly outrageous given Trump's ongoing threats to escalate [32]deadly [33] strikes on alleged "drug boats," which he has labelled a threat to U.S. national security. The administration's murderous attacks on random vessels have always been morally indefensible and transparently aimed at regime change, but pardoning a man who once boasted that he would "stuff the drugs up the gringos' noses" pushed the hypocrisy to new extremes.
Despite expectations [34] that the pardon would harm Asfura, the political fallout appears minimal. In fact, amid rising costs of living and a deepening security crisis, some voters cast ballots for [35] Asfura precisely because they associate him with Hernández, whose tenure they now recall more favorably. Whether he ultimately wins or not, Asfura's popularity surged in the lead-up to election day, an effect many observers attribute to Trump's support. [36]
Though the Honduran left will soon be out of power [37], there was one piece of encouraging news: despite predictions of [38] widespread unrest, the situation has so far remained relatively calm [39].
From NACLA Update [40], Dec. 5. Slightly edited. Internal links added.
See our special feature [41]: "The Paradox of Trump's Drug War: Pardons for the Convicted, Drone Strikes for the Suspected"
