Right wing resurgence
Trump Ally Declared Victor in Honduran Presidential Election
The conservative National Party leader Nasry Asfura narrowly defeated Salvador Nasralla of the center-right Liberal Party. The election was held on November 30, but repeated system failures delayed the final count by more than three weeks.
Nasry Asfura has been declared the winner of Honduras’s presidential election following weeks of technical delays and fraud allegations, according to the country’s National Electoral Council.
The conservative National Party candidate won 40.3 percent of the vote, narrowly defeating Salvador Nasralla of the center-right Liberal Party, who received 39.5 percent. The election was held on November 30, but repeated system failures delayed the final count by more than three weeks.
In a brief statement, Asfura said he was “ready to govern” and promised not to disappoint voters. Nasralla rejected the result, saying he would not accept an outcome “built on omissions,” though he urged supporters to remain calm and avoid unrest.
The prolonged count fueled tensions nationwide. Technical outages twice halted tabulation, forcing electoral officials to hand-count roughly 15 percent of ballots. The head of the electoral council blamed a private contractor for conducting uncoordinated system maintenance that caused the breakdowns.
Outgoing President Xiomara Castro accused opponents of attempting an “electoral coup” and alleged foreign interference. Protests erupted last week in Tegucigalpa, with thousands of supporters of Castro’s left-wing Libre party demonstrating against what they described as election fraud.
Asfura was openly backed by U.S. President Donald Trump, who warned there would be “hell to pay” if the result were overturned and threatened to cut U.S. funding if Asfura lost. Earlier this month, Trump also pardoned former Honduran president Juan Orlando Hernández, a senior National Party figure who had been serving a lengthy U.S. prison sentence for drug trafficking.
U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio called on all parties to respect the result and said Washington looks forward to working with Asfura’s incoming administration on security cooperation, migration enforcement, and economic ties.
Asfura, a former mayor of Tegucigalpa, is of Palestinian descent but leads a firmly pro-Israel party. Israel’s foreign minister confirmed contact with Asfura and said both sides agreed to strengthen bilateral relations. Honduras was one of the few countries to move its embassy to Jerusalem in 2021, a policy Asfura has supported.
The razor-thin result is expected to face legal and political challenges, setting the stage for a tense transition ahead of Asfura’s inauguration.