Trump-backed candidate Nasry Asfura winner of Honduras’ presidential vote : NPR

TEGUCIGALPA, Honduras — Trump-backed candidate Nasry Asfura received Honduras’ presidential election, electoral authorities stated Wednesday afternoon, ending a weeks-long rely that has whittled away on the credibility of the Central American nation’s fragile electoral system.

The election is constant Latin America’s swing to the proper, coming only a week after Chile selected the far-right politician José Antonio Kast as its subsequent president.

Asfura, of the conservative Nationwide Social gathering acquired 40.27% of the vote within the Nov. 30, edging out four-time candidate Salvador Nasralla of the conservative Liberal Social gathering, who completed with 39.53% of the vote.

Honduras’ president-elect

The previous mayor of Honduras’ capital Tegucigalpa, received in his second bid for the presidency, after he and Nasralla have been neck-and-neck throughout a weeks-long vote rely that fueled worldwide concern.

On Tuesday night time quite a few electoral officers and candidates have been already combating and contesting the outcomes of the election. In the meantime, followers in Asfura’s marketing campaign headquarters erupted into cheers.

“Honduras: I’m ready to control,” wrote Asfura in a publish on X shortly after the outcomes have been launched. “I cannot allow you to down.”

The outcomes have been a rebuke of the present leftist chief, and her governing democratic socialist Liberty and Re-foundation Social gathering, referred to as LIBRE, whose candidate completed in a distant third place with 19.19% of the vote.

Trump takes a highlight in Honduras

Secretary of State Marco Rubio congratulated Asfura on Wednesday, writing on a publish on X: “The folks of Honduras have spoken … (the Trump administration) appears ahead to working together with his administration to advance prosperity and safety in our hemisphere.”

The European Union and variety of right-leading leaders throughout Latin America, specifically Trump-ally Argentine President Javier Milei, additionally congratulated the politician.

Asfura ran as a practical politician, pointing to his well-liked infrastructure tasks within the capital. Trump endorsed the 67-year-old conservative simply days earlier than the vote, saying he was the one Honduran candidate the U.S. administration would work with.

Nasralla maintained the declare that the election was fraudulent on Wednesday, saying electoral authorities who introduced the outcomes “betrayed the Honduran folks.”

On Tuesday night time, he additionally addressed Trump in a publish on X, writing: “Mr. President, your endorsed candidate in Honduras is complicit in silencing the votes of our residents. If he’s actually worthy of your backing, if his palms are clear, if he has nothing to worry, then why does not he enable for each vote to be counted?”

He and different opponents of Asfura have maintained that Trump’s last-minute endorsement was an act of electoral interference that finally swung the outcomes of the vote.

Supporters of the Nationwide Social gathering have a good time because the Nationwide Electoral Council decelerate presidential candidate Nasry Asfura the winner of Honduras’ presidential election in Tegucigalpa, Honduras, Wednesday, Dec. 24, 2025.

Fernando Destephen/AP

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Fernando Destephen/AP

A chaotic election

The unexpectedly tumultuous election was additionally marred by a sluggish vote rely, which fueled much more accusations.

The Central American nation was caught in limbo for greater than three weeks as vote counting by electoral authorities lagged, and at one level was paralyzed after a particular rely of ultimate vote tallies was known as, fueling warnings by worldwide leaders.

After expressing democratic concern in regards to the lack of outcomes days earlier than, Group of American States Secretary Common Albert Rambin wrote on a publish on X on Wednesday that the OAS “takes be aware” of the outcomes introduced and famous it’s “carefully following occasions in Honduras”.

It additionally condemned electoral authorities for saying the outcomes whereas the ultimate .07% of votes have been counted with such razor-thin margins within the election.

A rightward shift in Latin America

For the incumbent, progressive President Xiomara Castro, the election marked a political reckoning. She was elected in 2021 on a promise to scale back violence and root out corruption.

She was amongst a gaggle of progressive leaders in Latin American who have been elected on a hopeful message of change round 5 years in the past however at the moment are being forged out after failing to ship on their imaginative and prescient. Castro stated final week that she would settle for the outcomes of the elections even after she claimed that Trump’s actions within the election amounted to an “electoral coup.”

However Eric Olson, an impartial worldwide observer in the course of the Honduran election with the Seattle Worldwide Basis, and different observers stated the rejection of Castro and her social gathering was so definitive that they’d little room to contest the outcomes.

“Only a few folks, even inside LIBRE, consider they received the election. What they may say is there’s been fraud, that there was intervention by Donald Trump, that we we must always tear up the elections and vote once more,” Olson stated. “However they are not saying ‘we received the elections.’ It is fairly clear they didn’t.”