Trump Leverages Honduras Election, Ties US Policy to Asfura Victory

By Staff, Agencies

US President Donald Trump has directly intervened in Honduras’s presidential race, endorsing right-wing candidate Nasry Asfura and vowing to pardon former president Juan Orlando Hernandez, who is currently serving a 45-year drug-trafficking sentence in the United States.

In a Truth Social post, Trump said the US would be “very supportive” if Asfura wins Sunday’s vote, but warned that Washington “will not be throwing good money after bad” should he lose—an unusually explicit attempt to influence another nation’s electoral outcome.

Trump had previously backed Asfura, but Friday’s message marked a shift by overtly tying future US policy to the result.

Asfura, a former Tegucigalpa mayor and candidate of the conservative National Party, welcomed the endorsement and denied any links to Hernandez.

Trump also pledged to grant Hernandez a full presidential pardon, calling the former leader “treated very harshly and unfairly,” despite Hernandez’s conviction in a US federal court for facilitating the smuggling of nearly 400 tonnes of cocaine into the United States. Hernandez, who governed from 2014 to 2022, was extradited shortly after his term ended.

The intervention comes days before Hondurans vote in a tight three-way contest between Asfura, left-wing candidate Rixi Moncada, and right-wing television host Salvador Nasralla. Trump accused Nasralla of acting as a spoiler for the conservative vote and labelled Moncada a “communist,” claiming her victory would empower Venezuela’s Nicolás Maduro and “his Narcoterrorists.”

The pardon promise also lands amid a broader US anti-drug operation across Latin America, where Washington says it is targeting narcotics networks; more than 80 people have reportedly been killed in strikes in international waters since September.

Hernandez’s conviction followed years of US investigations. After his sentencing, then-Attorney General Merrick Garland said he had “abused his power to support one of the largest and most violent drug trafficking conspiracies in the world.”

Trump tied both the endorsement and the promised pardon directly to Sunday’s vote. “Vote for Tito Asfuro for president, and congratulations to Juan Orlando Hernandez on your upcoming pardon,” he wrote, portraying an Asfura victory as the key to “Great Political and Financial Success” for Honduras.