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Hernández’s Return to Honduras Tees Up a Presidential Power Struggle
['James Bosworth', 'Elliot Waldman', 'Frida Ghitis', 'Paul Poast', 'Judah Grunstein', 'Charli Carpenter', 'Ulrike Franke', 'Mary Gallagher', 'Candace Rondeaux', 'Amanda Coakley']
World Politics Review
Share this article:XBlueskyFacebookGet Article LinkFormer President Juan Orlando Hernández is back in Honduras.
Last December, amid a contentious presidential race in Honduras, U.S. President Donald Trump pardoned Hernández and erased the 45-year federal prison sentence he was serving following his conviction in 2024.
Hernández remained wanted in Honduras on corruption charges, but in June, a judge suspended the domestic arrest warrant in that case, which had prevented him from returning home.
The current president of Honduras, Nasry Asfura, belongs to the same National Party as Hernández, and rose to power in part thanks to his support.
Asfura won last year’s tightly contested election after an endorsement from Trump—one that came in the same social media post announcing Hernández’s pardon—and following a month-long, controversial vote-counting process that left half the country questioning whether he legitimately won.