The former Honduran president Juan Orlando Hernández, pardoned by the United States from a 45-year prison sentence for drug trafficking and illegal arms trade, He will return to Honduras tomorrow voluntarily to respond to the charges of fraud and money laundering before the Honduran justice system, and put it to the test, as the anti-corruption entity has warned.
Hernández, 57 years old, is a politician who at the time managed to mobilize a good part of the Hondurans, before whom he showed himself to be a leader of strong character, and who generated controversy for several measures during his mandates, including his questioned re-election in 2017.
These are the keys to understand his return:
The first former Honduran president to be extradited
Hernández governed Honduras for two consecutive terms (2014-2022). In April 2022, just three months after transferring power, He became the country’s first former president extradited to the United States.
In 2024, a federal court in New York sentenced him to 45 years in prison for three charges related to arms trafficking and the conspiracy to bring hundreds of tons of cocaine into United States territory, and even having received money from the Mexican kingpin Joaquín ‘El Chapo’ Guzmán.
Trump’s presidential pardon
Hernández’s legal outlook took a radical turn in 2025, when the former head of state regained his freedom on December 1 of that year, after receiving a pardon from US President Donald Trump, who stated that the administration of former President Joe Biden (2021-2025) had “set a trap” for the former Honduran ruler.
Trump announced the presidential pardon on November 28, on the eve of the general elections in Honduras won by the conservative Nasry Titus Asfura, from the National Party, with whom Hernández has an affinity.
After the executive measure, federal judge Kevin Castel formalized the annulment of the sentence and the definitive closure of the file.
A voluntary return
Hernández’s return will take place after a Honduran judge provisionally suspend the international arrest warrant and the Interpol red alert that weighed against him.
The judicial determination responded to a request made by the former president’s defense to submit to justice voluntarily, which guarantees you enter the country without being detained immediately upon arrival.
Pending processes in Honduras
The former ruler will have to face in Honduras a process for alleged fraud and money laundering related to the alleged diversion of public funds used to finance his electoral campaign in 2013, within a plot that also includes former president Porfirio Lobo (2010-2014), former deputies and businessmen.
A competent judge set the initial hearing for the declaration of charges for next August 3, in which Hernández will be formally informed of the charges and his legal representation will request that he be allowed to face the criminal process under alternative measures to preventive detention.
“Everyone else involved in that process they showed up voluntarily; most of them have already been released from their charges, are free and the others follow a common and ordinary process,” declared Hernández, regarding the accusation, in an interview with EFE, in Miami (USA).
Litmus test for the justice system
The return of the former president revives the debate on the independence of the Honduran Judiciary.
While his close circle and related militants consider his return as an opportunity to prove his innocence, various voices from the opposition and anti-corruption organizations They express their fear of possible procedural privileges.
The director of the National Anti-Corruption Council (CNA), Gabriela Castellanos, believes that The challenge is not the return of Hernández, but to demonstrate that justice acts without privileges.
“The problem has never been his return. The problem has always been the ease with which power finds protection”, stated the official, pointing out that her case will be a test for Honduran institutions.
Along the same lines, the former presidential candidate of the leftist Libertad y Refoundación (Libre) Rixi Moncada has demanded that institutions apply the law objectively and without concessions.