Former US President-Endorsed Contender Asfura Proclaimed New President of the Central American Nation
Donald Trump-backed candidate Nasry “Tito” Asfura was proclaimed the winner of Honduras’s presidential election after a ballot tally that dragged on for nearly four weeks and was clouded by claims of irregularities and accusations of interference by the American leader.
The rightwing Asfura, 67, a building tycoon and former mayor of the capital city, Tegucigalpa, obtained 40.27% of the vote, compared to 39.53% for the moderate right Salvador Nasralla, a difference of just 28,000 ballots.
The election authority declared a victor prior to finishing the examination of all vote records under a “special scrutiny” initiated last week to re-tally votes flagged as “inconsistent”. The move was decried by defeated candidates and lamented by the OAS, which sent an monitoring team to the election held on 30 November.
Asfura has already declared himself the elected president. “The nation, we now have the official declaration from the CNE [supreme electoral tribunal]. I acknowledge the great work carried out by the councillors and the entire team that administered the election. My fellow citizens: I am prepared to lead. I will not fail you. God bless Honduras,” he wrote.
Nasralla declined to accept defeat and posted a number of messages claiming manipulation in the tallying procedure, including “forgery of public documents”, claiming that “the figures from the original tally sheets were altered”.
The election board is made up of three members: one affiliated with Asfura’s party, one with Nasralla’s, and one with the party of the leftist president, Xiomara Castro, whose candidate came in third place. Asfura’s win was declared only by the initial pair of councillors.
The representative associated with the president’s party rejected the result, claimed that an “stolen election” was under way and filed a legal challenge with the public prosecutor’s office, opening the possibility that the outcome will be challenged in the judiciary.
In its announcement, the council said: “By the majority will of the Honduran people, expressed freely at the ballot box, the full council of the CNE proclaims Nasry Juan Asfura Zablah constitutional president of the Republic of Honduras for the presidential term starting 27 January 2026 and ending on 27 January 2030.”
The declaration before the end of the review was the latest in a string of controversies that characterized the Central American country’s election campaign, beginning with what many saw as blatant meddling by the American head of state.
Days before the election, Trump openly endorsed Asfura, stated the US would support the next government only if he won, and attacked the other leading candidates, calling them socialists or allies of Venezuela’s authoritarian leader, Nicolás Maduro.
On the night of the election, the US president also announced a pardon for the former Honduran president and Asfura ally Juan Orlando Hernández, who had been sentenced 45 years in prison for reportedly creating “a major drug trafficking route to the United States”.
The American top diplomat, Marco Rubio, offered congratulations to Asfura on a public platform. “The citizens of Honduras have made their choice: Nasry Asfura is Honduras’ incoming leader,” said Rubio. “The United States congratulates president-elect Asfura and anticipates working with his government to advance economic growth and safety in our region.”
