MEXICO CITY — Juan Orlando Hernandez, a convicted drug trafficker who prosecutors say “built a cocaine superhighway” into the United States, walked out of a West Virginia prison a free man this week.
That's thanks to President Trump, who on Monday granted a full pardon to Hernandez, the former right-wing leader of Honduras who was serving a prison sentence. 45 years imprisonment for supporting what the U.S. Attorney General called “one of the largest and most brutal drug trafficking conspiracies in the world.”
Trump's emergency delay angered many in Latin America and raised critical questions about his escalating military campaign in the region, which the president insists is aimed at combating the drug trade.
Trump warned Tuesday of imminent “ground strikes” in Venezuela, whose leftist leader Nicolas Maduro has been labeled a “narco dictator” by the White House, which appears intent on removing him from power.
“If Trump is supposedly an anti-drug activist, why did he pardon a convicted trafficker?” said Dana Frank, professor emeritus at the University of California, Santa Cruz, who specializes in recent history of Honduras and Latin America. She called the White House's drug war narrative little more than a pretext to advance U.S. economic and political interests in the region and justify “attacks on governments in the hemisphere that do not follow what the United States wants.”
The US has killed dozens of suspected small-time drug traffickers in rocket attacks on boats in the Caribbean and Pacific Ocean and massed 15,000 troops and a fleet of warships and fighter jets off the coast of Venezuela.
Venezuela, home to the world's largest known oil reserves, has been under the control of Maduro's leftist authoritarian government since 2013.
The White House has gone to great lengths this year to portray Maduro as a drug-trafficking ringleader who heads a smuggling network known as the Cartel de los Soles of senior Venezuelan military officials. Last month the administration appointed Cartel de los Soles as a foreign terrorist group.
But security experts in Venezuela and U.S. law enforcement officials say the Cartel de los Soles, unlike Mexico's, is not a well-organized drug smuggling organization. They say it is also unclear whether Maduro is running illegal activities or whether he is simply looking the other way, perhaps in an attempt to win loyalty while his generals enrich themselves. Maduro says the accusations are false and that the US is trying to overthrow him in order to gain access to Venezuelan oil.
On the other hand, the evidence against Hernandez was much more compelling.
Hernandez has been implicated in several drug trafficking cases brought by U.S. authorities, who accused him of facilitating the movement of 400 tons of drugs through Honduras and accepting millions of dollars in bribes from Mexican cartel leader Joaquin “El Chapo” Guzman. Hernandez, prosecutors say, used his military to protect traffickers and once boasted that he was going to “shove drugs right up the gringo's nose” by flooding the United States with cocaine.
Hernandez insisted that the case against him was politically motivated and that his 2024 conviction was based on the testimony of witnesses – mostly convicted drug traffickers – who were not credible. The Trump administration cited those reasons this week in explaining the presidential pardon.
Hernandez's wife, Ana Garcia de Hernandez, called the pardon an act of justice, writing on social media: “After nearly four years of pain, waiting and ordeal, my husband Juan Orlando Hernandez is RETURNED as a free man thanks to a presidential pardon granted by President Donald Trump.”
The pardon appears to be related to the Trump administration's attempt to influence the results of the recent presidential election in Honduras.
Ahead of Sunday's vote, Trump threatened on social media to withhold aid to Honduras unless voters elect conservative candidate Nasri “Tito” Asfura of Hernandez's National Party. Trump also criticized the current president of Honduras, leftist Xiamora Castro.
Election results were still being tallied on Tuesday but showed Asfoura facing another conservative Liberal Party candidate, Salvador Nasralla. Castro was far behind.
Since returning to the White House this year, Trump strived for dominance In Latin America, like few presidents in recent memory, they are cutting deals with right-wing leaders such as Argentina's Javier Millay and El Salvador's Nayib Bukele, and punishing left-wing governments with tariffs and sanctions.
Trump and his officials have openly tried to influence other elections by supporting right-wing candidates in recent elections in Argentina and Peru.
“This is an intimidation of the democratic process,” Frank said. “This is a disaster for the sovereignty of these countries.”
Domestically, Trump has repeatedly intervened in the justice system by issuing pardons.
His reprieve for Hernandez comes amid a flurry of pardon efforts from the president, whose pardon lawyer Ed Martin has openly advocated for Justice Department investigations that would burden Trump's political enemies, as well as leniency for his friends and allies. “Maga has not been left behind,” Martin wrote on social media in May.
Legal experts say the president's pardons and commutations appear to be aimed at people accused of abuses of power and white collar crimes – crimes that Trump has been accused of throughout his adult life.
Just in the last few weeks, the President has proposed replacing George Santosa former congressman convicted of defrauding donors; and David Gentile, a private equity executive convicted of a $1.6 billion scheme that prosecutors say defrauded thousands of ordinary investors.
He also pardoned Changpeng Zhaoa crypto-finance executive with ties to the Trump family who pleaded guilty to money laundering, and Paul Walczak, a nursing home executive who pleaded guilty to tax crimes only for his mother to secure a pardon for him at a dinner at Mar-a-Lago.
The pardon action has divided Trump's base of supporters, some of whom see the president as championing conservative voices who have faced political persecution under the Biden administration. Others still believe Trump is protecting wealthy allies as much of the country faces an affordability crisis.
Linthicum reported from Mexico City and Willner from Washington.
