Nearly four years after being extradited to the United States to face a drug trafficking trial, former Honduran President Juan Orlando Hernandez returned home after being pardoned by US President Donald Trump late last year.
President Trump claimed the trial was a “setup” orchestrated by former President Joe Biden’s administration.
Hernandez still faces corruption charges in Honduras, but the warrant for his arrest was revoked and he returned to the country on Sunday.
Human rights activists and lawyers fear the trial on the mainland, where the party is president, will be a sham.
So why did President Trump pardon and release the former president of Honduras, even though Venezuela’s Nicolás Maduro was kidnapped and arrested on drug and gun charges in January?
Why did Hernandez return to Honduras?
Hernandez was released from a U.S. prison after being pardoned by Trump and was able to return after a warrant for his arrest was suspended last month.
He arrived at Palmerola International Airport and was greeted by his family and National Party supporters.
Mr. Hernandez led the country from 2014 to 2022, during which time he once boasted that he would “put drugs up the gringo’s nose,” referring to Americans, according to U.S. prosecutors.
Immediately after leaving office, he was extradited to the United States, where he was found guilty by a federal jury of involvement in a scheme to export cocaine to the United States and sentenced to 45 years in prison.
Prosecutors described the scheme as “one of the largest and most violent drug trafficking conspiracies in the world.” He was convicted of accepting millions of dollars in bribes from a violent drug lord over an 18-year period, which he allegedly used to advance his political career.
“During his political career, Mr. Hernandez abused his powerful position and authority in Honduras to facilitate the importation of more than 400 tons of cocaine into the United States,” the U.S. Justice Department said after his conviction last year.
During his trial, Hernandez denied accepting bribes from drug traffickers, claiming he was actually cracking down on the drug trade and citing his administration’s cooperation with the U.S. military.
“I cannot deny that I feel deep emotions and joy in my heart to be back home,” Hernandez wrote on social media earlier this month, adding that he was counting down the days until he could see his family again.
“It wasn’t easy. The process was very difficult… and what I went through in prison, I really wouldn’t wish on anyone,” he added.
Hernandez is scheduled to appear in court on August 3 on corruption charges in Honduras.
Why did Trump pardon him?
Under the U.S. Constitution, the president can grant two types of pardons for federal crimes. One is a pardon, which pardons the defendant of his federal crimes and restores his civil liberties, and the other is a commutation, which ignores the conviction and reduces the sentence.
Hernandez was pardoned by President Trump in December. The US president said Hernandez did not receive a fair trial and was “framed” by the Biden administration.
Trump added that Hernandez was “treated very harshly and unfairly.”
At the same time, Mr. Trump also supported right-wing candidate Nasry “Tito” Asfulura, a member of Mr. Hernandez’s party. He ran in November’s presidential election, and after delays and allegations of fraud, he was declared the winner in a close race a month later. He took office in January.
The Pandora Papers corruption investigation also accused Hernandez of diverting nearly $11 million in state funds to political campaigns between 2010 and 2013.
Why amnesty for some and imprisonment for others?
While the Trump administration pardoned the Honduran leader, it faces criticism at home for its January abduction of former Venezuelan President Maduro and his wife, Syria Flores, on similar charges.
Mr. Maduro and Mr. Flores were captured by U.S. forces in Caracas and sent to New York, where he faces firearms and drug charges and accusations of being a “narco-terrorist.”
At the time of Maduro’s abduction and since then, the Trump administration has targeted small vessels in the Caribbean and Eastern Pacific Ocean, alleging without evidence that they are involved in drug trafficking. More than 220 people have been killed in more than 60 such attacks on small boats, which many lawyers and activists consider extrajudicial killings.
Since taking office for a second term in January 2025, President Trump has ordered more than 1,800 pardons benefiting a variety of individuals, including crypto billionaires, disgraced politicians, and hundreds of political allies.
Some of the most controversial beneficiaries are supporters of Mr. Biden’s Make America Great Again (MAGA) movement, including the hundreds of rioters who stormed the U.S. Capitol on January 6, 2021, in an effort to stop the certification of Mr. Biden’s election victory over Mr. Trump two months earlier.
Legal experts argue that while the president’s pardon power is far-reaching, it could be used for purportedly corrupt purposes, such as protecting political allies or obstructing justice, as grounds for impeachment proceedings.
U.S. constitutional law expert Bruce Fein told Al Jazeera that the framers of the U.S. Constitution “understood that abuse of the pardon power to protect political or personal friends constitutes impeachable high crimes and misdemeanors that justify the removal of a president through impeachment proceedings.”
“If the Democrats take control of Congress in the midterm elections, Mr. Trump will be at risk of impeachment for pardoning Mr. Hernandez,” Fein said, referring to the November elections.
