Latin Analysis: Honduran General Election Marked By Distrust, Delays, And Public Grievances
Reuters
The 2025 general election in Honduras is unfolding in an atmosphere of deep uncertainty. The contest is extremely close, the vote count has suffered repeated delays, and Honduras’ fraught political history has heightened anxieties about electoral manipulation and post-election instability. While the final outcome may not be known until the end of December, the context in which the vote is taking place already reveals a great deal about the grievances shaping public opinion, the erosion of trust in institutions, and the impact of foreign interference. Understanding these dynamics is essential to making sense of the elections and Honduras’ political future.
A Tight Race And Delayed Vote Count
On November 30, 2025, Hondurans cast ballots for the president, all 128 members of Congress, and thousands of municipal officials in a single-round system where the presidential candidate with the most votes wins outright. Congressional seats are allocated through open-list proportional representation across 18 multi-member constituencies, where voters choose both a party and their preferred candidates, and seats are divided based on each party’s overall share of the vote. More than 6.5 million people were eligible to vote, including nearly 400,000 Honduran citizens living in the United States who could only cast ballots for the presidency.
The National Electoral Council released preliminary results that placed the two leading candidates – National Party contender Nasry Tito Asfura and Liberal Party candidate Salvador Nasralla – in what it described as a “technical tie”. As counting advanced, the results swung repeatedly between the two. Technical outages have suspended the process twice. These stoppages have been widely criticised and have revived memories of 2017, when a delayed vote count led to weeks of unrest and dozens of deaths. The electoral authority has until December 30 to declare a winner, and a manual count is said to be underway.
Public Concerns At The Polls
Honduran voters brought an extensive list of grievances to the polls - evident in voters’ discourse on social media and in interviews with the press - but employment remains the top concern. Although unemployment has fallen since 2021, almost three-quarters of the workforce still labours in the informal sector. Poverty stands at 63%, one of the highest levels in the region. On top of this, years of storms, flooding, and gang violence have driven mass displacement, both internally and toward Mexico and the United States. These structural pressures have persisted despite campaign promises from the governing Libre party in 2021 to reduce poverty and address corruption and insecurity. While some gains have been made, it is not enough to shift public perception.
Another major concern is security. Hondurans have been living under a state of exception since December 2022, an emergency measure that suspends constitutional rights in an effort to curb extortion and gang activity. Although murder rates have fallen in cities such as Tegucigalpa and San Pedro Sula, this downward trend predates the current government, while reports of forced disappearances are increasing in rural areas. The state of exception - initially intended to last 45 days - has been extended at least 17 times, with many issued without congressional approval, and this has fuelled frustration with both the government’s performance and its broader national security strategy.
Corruption is another major grievance among Hondurans. Libre, the outgoing party, came into office promising to establish an anti-corruption commission, but failed to do so. Broader concerns about political influence over independent institutions as well as several corruption scandals have left many voters disillusioned. This context has created a perceptible rightward shift in the electorate, with leading candidates Asfura and Nasralla positioning themselves as alternatives to Libre’s state-oriented economic model. The combination of these grievances has produced an electorate accustomed with economic hardship, insecurity, institutional decay, and political fatigue.
A Legacy Of Disputed Elections Continues
Elections in Honduras in recent decades have been largely contested, especially since the 2009 coup that removed President Manuel Zelaya. Only a transfer of power in 2021 avoided major dispute. The 2013 and 2017 elections were steeped in accusations of electoral fraud from opposition figures, including Xiomara Castro and Salvador Nasralla. In 2017, Juan Orlando Hernández secured re-election despite a constitutional ban and strong international pressure for a recount.
This legacy continued in the run up to this year’s elections. In late October, prosecutors opened an investigation into an alleged plan to manipulate vote counts that reportedly involved a member of the electoral council, a National Party legislator, and a military officer. Libre party officials claimed the opposition was plotting an electoral coup. The accused insisted that the recordings used as evidence were artificially generated. The controversy intensified when the head of the armed forces requested access to voting records, a step not authorised by the constitution. Opposition leaders accused the government of colluding with the military to influence the election, and the armed forces for delays in the delivery of materials during the March primaries.
These tensions are now amplified by the current technical interruptions. Given Honduras’ history, every procedural failure is interpreted through the lens of past manipulation. Local and international observers had already warned that volatility was likely. The narrow margin between the candidates, together with the accusations of fraud, raises the probability of post-election unrest including protests, roadblocks, and clashes with the security forces.
Foreign Interference In The Vote
The United States has historically exerted influence in Honduran politics, but the level of direct interference in the 2025 contest appears to be unprecedented. President Donald Trump has endorsed Asfura and threatened to cut off aid to Honduras if he did not win. When partial results briefly put Nasralla ahead by around 500 votes, Trump accused the Honduran electoral authority of “trying to change” the outcome, without evidence, and later declared that there would be “hell to pay” if they were.
This month, Trump also pardoned former president Juan Orlando Hernández, who had been convicted on drug trafficking charges. The move shocked many Hondurans and was widely interpreted as another attempt to tilt the election in favour of Asfura, who is an ally of Hernández and is strongly supported by the Trump administration. Honduran officials described the pardon as an act of foreign interference. Libre candidate Rixi Moncada accused Trump of imperial interventionism and warned that his actions threatened the credibility of the electoral process.
President Trump has intervened in other elections in the region, including Argentina’s October 2025 midterms. In Honduras, these interventions have deepened public mistrust in an already fragile process and worsened fears that the final result will not be a product of domestic legitimacy, but instead one shaped by foreign pressure.
The conditions surrounding the November vote reveal a precarious political environment, and a repeatedly disrupted electoral process rooted in a long history of contested elections. Whichever candidate becomes president will take office amid significant structural challenges and inherit a disillusioned electorate concerned about unemployment, insecurity, and corruption. Managing these concerns alongside potential post-election tensions will be central to establishing political stability and setting the direction of the new administration.