The U.S. president also reaffirmed his support for Nasry Asfura, the conservative candidate in the neck-and-neck Honduras election.
President Donald Trump announced Friday he is granting a full pardon to former Honduran President Juan Orlando Hernandez, who is currently serving a 45-year U.S. prison sentence for drug trafficking and firearms convictions after being convicted by a jury.
“I will be granting a Full and Complete Pardon to Former President Juan Orlando Hernandez who has been, according to many people that I greatly respect, treated very harshly and unfairly,” Trump wrote in a post on Truth Social on Friday.
Hernandez, who served as president of Honduras from 2014 to 2022, was convicted by a Manhattan jury in March 2024 of accepting millions in bribes to protect cocaine shipments headed to the United States after vowing to fight drug traffickers. The jury handed down his sentence in June 2024, with Hernandez still maintaining his innocence.
Trump’s pardon comes as he takes a hardline approach to drug trafficking, especially in regards to Venezuela, and as Honduras heads into a hotly contested presidential election Sunday.
Trump also reaffirmed his support for conservative National Party candidate Nasry Asfura, the former mayor of Tegucigalpa.
Trump warned that U.S. aid could be cut if Asfura is not victorious.
“If he doesn’t win, the United States will not be throwing good money after bad, because a wrong Leader can only bring catastrophic results to a country, no matter which country it is,” Trump posted on Truth Social.
While leading the country, Hernandez ensured the National Party had strong ties with Washington through security partnerships against drug trafficking. U.S. prosecutors, however, said Hernandez accepted bribes from cartels and ordered the Honduran military to secure a cocaine lab as well as drug shipments headed to the United States.
His brother, Tony Hernandez, a former congressman, received a life sentence in a U.S. prison in 2021 for similar drug charges, with prosecutors calling a related forfeiture “blood money.”
