The president of the United States, Donald Trump, has gotten directly involved in Honduras’s presidential elections by openly backing right-wing businessman Nasry Asfura, just four days before the general vote. Trump broke his silence on the electoral process to urge Hondurans to vote for the former mayor of Tegucigalpa, whom he called the “only true friend of freedom.”
His endorsement came along with harsh attacks on the candidate of the ruling Libre party (left), Rixi Moncada, who is seeking to succeed President Xiomara Castro, and on Salvador Nasralla of the right-wing Liberal Party (PL).
“I cannot work with Moncada and the communists, and Nasralla is not a reliable ally for freedom, and he cannot be trusted,” Trump warned on his Truth Social network. Asfura thanked Trump for the backing at a tense moment in which all three candidates are accusing each other of planning fraud, and there is no clear favorite to win the single-round presidential race.
“Many thanks for the support, President @realdonaldtrump (…). We stand firm to defend our democracy, our freedom, and the values that make our country great,” wrote Asfura, of the National Party (PN), on his social networks. Trump went even further, questioning whether Venezuelan president Nicolás Maduro and “his narco-terrorists will take control of another country as they have done with Cuba, Nicaragua and Venezuela.”
“Tito (Asfura) and I can work together to fight the narco-communists and provide the necessary help to the people of Honduras,” he said. The Republican maintains a massive military deployment in the Caribbean, near Venezuela, as part of his efforts to hasten Maduro’s exit from power, since he does not recognize him as president.
The shadows hanging over his protégé
Asfura, a 67-year-old construction businessman, won Trump’s favor even though his party carries the stigma of a former president, Juan Orlando Hernández (2014–2022), who is serving a 45-year prison sentence in the United States for drug trafficking. “Everyone is responsible for their own actions,” defends the politician of Palestinian descent, who has centered his campaign on a promise to “save democracy” from the “communists.”
His record is marred by allegations of corruption. He was accused of allegedly embezzling municipal funds, but the case did not move forward. Asfura, known for greeting people with his popular phrase “Papi, at your service!”, was also mentioned in the “Pandora Papers” list for having offshore companies registered in Panama to allegedly evade taxes.
Even so, his critics acknowledge that from city hall he modernized the capital with infrastructure projects. Like the Liberal candidate, Asfura has expressed his intention to move closer to Taiwan, which China claims as part of its territory.
Trump’s reproaches
Trump faulted the candidate of the ruling Libre party for her admiration of former Cuban president Fidel Castro. Without mentioning the U.S. president by name, Moncada, a 60-year-old lawyer, said that they call her a “communist” because she is proposing tax hikes on the economic elites.
Trump reproached Nasralla, a 72-year-old TV host, for having taken a senior post in Xiomara Castro’s government after dropping his own presidential bid and forming an alliance in the November 2021 elections. Nasralla later broke with the president, the wife of ousted former president Manuel Zelaya (2006–2009) and an ally of Venezuela and Cuba. “He pretends to be anti-communist just to split Asfura’s vote,” wrote the U.S. leader.
Nasralla attributed that claim to “malicious disinformation” from his political rivals and assured Trump that, if he wins, Trump will have in him “an ally.” Paradoxically, Castro enjoys the firm backing of the Armed Forces, which in 2009 carried out a right-wing coup d’état that toppled her husband, then president Manuel Zelaya.
