The Honduran presidential election remains neck-and-neck, with the National Party's Asfra and the Liberal Party's Nasrallah tied by just over 500 votes in the latest results. The continued website outages have further fueled unease. This highly anticipated election has intensified not only due to Trump's public endorsement of Asfra and his promise to pardon former President Ernandes, but also because both leading candidates have stated they would consider restoring diplomatic relations with Taiwan if elected. This makes the Honduran election a crucial factor in the diplomatic maneuvering between Taiwan and China.
Reuters reports that Honduran presidential candidates Nasry Asfura and Salvador Nasralla are nearly tied in Monday's latest vote count, with both receiving slightly less than 40% of the vote. The election has become even more closely contested due to problems with the official website.
Around noon local time on the 1st in Honduras, the election agency's website showed that Asfra, the conservative National Party candidate who received the support of US President Trump, led Liberal Party candidate Nasrallah by only 515 votes. However, due to continued malfunctions in the election system, the actual vote counting progress was unclear. Rixi Moncada, the candidate of the ruling Liberal and Reconstruction Party (LIBRE), came in third with 19%, a significant gap.
Asfula posted on X that his camp's internal estimates showed him leading with 44.6%. He stated,"We are not declaring victory, but merely predicting the results to be submitted to the National Electoral Commission (CNE) in the coming hours." National Party members criticized Nasrallah for rushing things before the final results were announced.
CNE Chair Ana Paola Hall also appealed on X to remain calm in the face of a"technically tied" situation and to patiently wait for the vote count to continue.
Asfra's lead has narrowed significantly since the preliminary results were announced on the evening of November 30. The winner of the simple majority will govern between 2026 and 2030.
Throughout the morning of the 1st, the official website used to update election results repeatedly crashed, sparking discontent among voters. The website was offline for extended periods, drawing criticism from local media.
Trump publicly supports Asfra.
On the eve of the election, Trump made a rare and significant intervention in the Honduran election, expressing his support for 67-year-old former mayor of Tegusigaba, Asfra, in multiple social media posts. He claimed that he could work with Asfra to combat drug crime and warned that"if he fails to win, the United States will no longer throw good money into a mess."
Trump also announced last Friday that he would pardon former Honduran President Juan Orlando Hernández. Hernández is serving a 45-year prison sentence in the United States for drug and firearms offenses and served as president of the National Party from 2014 to 2022.
Argentine President Javier Milei also publicly endorsed Asfra, calling him"the candidate who best represents the resistance against the left-wing tyrant who destroyed Honduras."
Asfrena Slaanesh said that if elected, he might restore diplomatic relations with Taiwan, which were suspended in 2023. If this comes to pass, it will be China's biggest diplomatic setback in Latin America in many years.
