Margins in the high-stakes Honduras presidential election have narrowed as center-right Liberal Party candidate Salvador Nasralla has closed the gap on Nasry Asfura, the Conservative National Party candidate backed by U.S. President Donald Trump.
The election was held on Nov. 30, with initial exit polling showing an advantage for Nasralla. As the count continued into Dec. 1, Asfura took the lead.
According to the most recent count by authorities, Asfura leads Nasralla by just 515 votes, with both holding around 40 percent of the vote. Rixi Moncada, of the ruling LIBRE Party, was in third with 19 percent of the vote.
It was not clear how many votes had been counted due to problems with the electoral portal.
“If they do, there will be hell to pay!” Trump wrote.
“The people of Honduras voted in overwhelming numbers on November 30th. The National Electoral Commission, the official body charged with counting the Votes, abruptly stopped counting at midnight on November 30th,” the U.S. president added.
“It is imperative that the Commission finish counting the Votes. Hundreds of thousands of Hondurans must have their Votes counted. Democracy must prevail!”
In the run-up to the Nov. 30 election, Trump threw his support behind Asfura, nicknamed “Tito,” in a series of social media posts. Trump said he could work with him to tackle drug trafficking and referred to aid money given to Honduras by the United States.
“Tito will be a Great President, and the United States will work closely with him in order to ensure the success, with all of its potential, of Honduras!” the U.S. president wrote, adding “Make Honduras Great Again!” in capital letters.
Argentine President Javier Milei also expressed support for Asfura on social media.
“My full support goes to Tito Asfura, who is the candidate who best represents the opposition to the left-wing tyrants who destroyed Honduras,” Milei said in a Nov. 28 post on X. “We are closely monitoring the electoral process in Honduras to ensure that the popular will and freedom in the region are respected.”
Both Asfura, a former mayor of the capital city Tegucigalpa, and Nasralla have said they would consider resuming diplomatic relations with Taiwan, after ties were severed in 2023.
Questions Over Election Integrity
The Nov. 30 election took place during a tense political climate with suggestions of vote-rigging. Moncada has implied that she would not recognize the official results, while the Organization of American States expressed concerns in early November about the electoral process.Some citizens and electoral observers criticized officials for turning away people who were still waiting to vote.
Most polls predicted a virtual tie between the three candidates in the build-up to election day.
The vote will see 128 members of the National Congress of Honduras, hundreds of mayors, and thousands of other public officials being chosen along with the president, who will govern the country between 2026 and 2030.
Honduras witnessed a coup in 2009 when an alliance of military figures, politicians, and businessmen overthrew Manuel Zelaya, husband of the outgoing president.
In 2021, Hondurans voted overwhelmingly for Castro, ending more than a century of rule by the National and Liberal parties.
The office of Honduras’s attorney general has accused the opposition parties of planning to commit voter fraud, which they deny.
Claims That Recordings Were AI
Prosecutors have opened an investigation into audio recordings in which a high-ranking National Party politician appeared to discuss plans with an unidentified military officer to influence the election. The scandal over the recordings played a major role in Moncada’s campaign.The National Party said the recordings were created using artificial intelligence.
The Honduran military has been criticized for asking the National Election Council to provide it with copies of the tally sheets on election day, which violates the country’s election laws.
These tensions contributed to a growing public distrust of the electoral authorities and the electoral process in general.
Castro, the first woman to govern Honduras, increased public investment and social spending during her term. Poverty has decreased but remains high, with the economy growing only slightly.
Although the country’s homicide rate has fallen to its lowest level in recent history, crime and violence remain a serious problem in the Central American country.
Human rights groups have criticized Castro for keeping a prolonged state of emergency in parts of the country and for continuing to rely on the military for policing in a continuation of the approach taken by her predecessor.
