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Donald Trump has said that he will pardon the former president of Honduras, Juan Orlando Hernández, who was convicted of drug trafficking charges in a US court last year.

The US president said Hernández had been "treated very harshly and unfairly" in a social media post announcing the move on Friday.

Hernández was found guilty in March 2024 of conspiring to import cocaine into the US, and of possessing machine guns. He was sentenced to 45 years in prison.

Trump also threw his support behind conservative presidential candidate Nasry "Tito" Asfura in the Central American nation's general election, due to be held on Sunday.

Hernández, a member of the National Party, who served as Honduras's president from 2014 to 2022, was extradited to the US in April 2022 to stand trial for running a violent drug trafficking conspiracy and helping to smuggle hundreds of tons of cocaine to the US.

He was convicted by a New York jury two years later.

Polls indicate the Honduran election remains a toss-up between three candidates including Asfura, the former mayor of Tegucigalpa and leader of the conservative National Party.

Also in the running is Rixi Moncada, a former defence minister standing for the ruling left-wing Libre Party, and Salvador Nasralla, a television host with the centrist Liberal Party.

Trump criticised Moncada and Nasralla on Friday, writing that the latter was "a boderline Communist" who was only running to split the vote between Moncada and Asfura.

He characterised Asfura as "standing up for democracy" and praised him for campaigning against Venezuela's President Nicolás Maduro, with whom Trump has engaged in a war of words in recent months.

Nasralla has pledged to cut ties with Venezuela if he wins.

The Trump administration has accused the left-wing Maduro - whose re-election last year was dismissed as illegitimate by many countries - of being the leader of a drugs cartel.

It used countering drug trafficking as a justification for a military build-up in the Caribbean and has conducted strikes on vessels it says have been used for smuggling - though some analysts have described these moves as a means of pressuring Latin American leaders.

Honduras has been governed since 2022 by President Xiomara Castro, who has forged close ties with Cuba and Venezuela.

But Castro has maintained a co-operative relationship with the US, agreeing to preserve a long-running extradition treaty with it. Her country also hosts a US military base involved in targeting transnational organised crime in the region.

More than 80 people have been killed in the US strikes on vessels suspected of being involved in the transport of narcotics since they began in August.

US Secretary of War Pete Hegseth has said the aim of "Operation Southern Spear" was to eliminate "narcoterrorists".

But legal experts have questioned the legality of the strikes, pointing out that the US has provided no evidence that the boats it has targeted were carrying drugs.

https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/c1kpm0rvxepo

Blow them up or give them pardons? Maybe it has to do with which tax bracket they are in?


Intoducing for The Cleveland Browns, Quarterback Deshawn "The Predator" Watson. He will also be the one to choose your next head coach.

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Hmmmm.... Trumpians have no comment about trump blowing up poor fishermen on small boats for bringing drugs "into our country", if you even believe these small fishing boats can travel 1900 miles to the U.S. in the first place...... But then pardons a big time, wealthy drug dealer............................

Honduran ex-president pardoned by Trump for drug trafficking is released from U.S. prison, wife says

A former Honduran president convicted of helping to smuggle 400 tons of cocaine into the United States has left prison after being pardoned by President Donald Trump, his wife said Tuesday.

Juan Orlando Hernandez was released from a West Virginia prison on Monday and was "once again a free man," his wife announced on social media. The U.S. Bureau of Prisons website showed the release of a man matching Hernandez's name and age.

His wife Ana García thanked Mr. Trump for pardoning Hernández via the social platform X early Tuesday.

"After almost four years of pain, of waiting and difficult challenges, my husband Juan Orlando Hernández RETURNED to being a free man, thanks to the presidential pardon granted by President Donald Trump," García's post said. She included a picture of the U.S. Bureau of Prisons listing for Hernández indicating his release.

Mr. Trump's controversial pardon came as the U.S. president is simultaneously ordering the bombing of boats in the Caribbean allegedly carrying drugs. He is also heavily backing a candidate from Hernandez's party in Honduras's tense, ongoing presidential election vote count.

Mr. Trump explained his decision on social media by posting that "according to many people that I greatly respect," Hernández was "treated very harshly and unfairly."

In March of last year, Hernandez was convicted in U.S. court of conspiring to import cocaine into the U.S. He had served two terms as the leader of the Central American nation of roughly 10 million people. Hernández has been appealing his conviction and serving time at the U.S. Penitentiary, Hazelton in West Virginia.

Shortly after Mr. Trump's announcement, Hernandez's wife and children gathered on the steps on their home in Tegucigalpa and kneeled in prayer, thanking God that Hernandez would return to their family after almost four years apart.

It was the same home that Honduran authorities hauled him out of in 2022 just months after leaving office. He was extradited to the United States to stand trial.

Trump's pardon drew criticism from lawmakers on both sides of the aisle.

Republican Sen. Bill Cassidy, of Louisiana, was critical of the pardon, saying Sunday on social media, "Why would we pardon [Hernandez] and then go after Maduro for running drugs into the United States? Lock up every drug runner! Don't understand why he is being pardoned."

"This is shocking," Sen. Tim Kaine, a Democrat of Virginia, said of the pardon on "Face the Nation with Margaret Brennan."

"He was convicted in a federal court in the United States," said Kaine, the ranking member on the Senate Foreign Relations Subcommittee on the Western Hemisphere. "One of the bits of evidence was his statement that was picked up by those near to him that he wanted to shove drugs up the nose of gringos and flood the United States with cocaine, more than 400 tons. He was the leader of one of the largest criminal enterprises that has ever been subject to a conviction in U.S. courts, and less than one year into his sentence, President Trump is pardoning him, suggesting that President Trump cares nothing about narcotrafficking. Suggesting possibly that pardons are now for sale by this White House."

Mr. Trump defended the move to reporters aboard Air Force One on Sunday, claiming, "Many of the people of Honduras said it was a Biden setup. ... He was the president of the country, and they basically said he was a drug dealer because he was the president of the country. And they said it was a Biden administration setup, and I looked at the facts and I agreed with them."

When asked what evidence he had seen to indicate Hernandez's case was a setup, Mr. Trump said, "You take any country you want, if somebody sells drugs in that country, that doesn't mean you arrest the president and put him in jail for the rest of his life."

White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt on Monday claimed it was a "clear Biden overprosecution," alleging that there was some "egregious" information that came out during Hernandez's trial.

https://www.cbsnews.com/news/hondur...r-president-prison-release-trump-pardon/

Maybe if these cartels would simply work together by renting a yacht to smuggle their drugs on everything would be fine. I mean the only difference between the two are their tax brackets.

So they're blowing up people without a trial while pardoning a man doing the same thing who got a trial. rolleyes

Maybe it's time some people quit believing any of what trump is doing in regards to Venezuela has to do with drugs.


Intoducing for The Cleveland Browns, Quarterback Deshawn "The Predator" Watson. He will also be the one to choose your next head coach.

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trump is out of his mind and a threat to the USA. Blow up mules on a boats that arent coming here and release a ring leader we have in jail. because Biden...WOW


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Yeah, a lot of his followers aren't smart enough to figure out it was "because jury".

The justice system now only counts if he thinks it's justice for the people who support him or people that he likes. It's that "Just us" system I've been talking about for so long taken to an entire new level.


Intoducing for The Cleveland Browns, Quarterback Deshawn "The Predator" Watson. He will also be the one to choose your next head coach.

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