President Donald Trump accused election officials in Honduras on Monday of "trying to change" their presidential election outcome, as a partial digital tally revealed the two frontrunners are locked in a "technical tie."
The National Electoral Council (CNE) has called for "patience" as it starts a manual count of the Nov. 30 vote, in one of Latin America's most impoverished and violent countries.
Trump-backed Nasry Asfura, 67, led 72-year-old rival Salvador Nasralla by just 515 votes, making it a "technical tie," CNE head Ana Paola Hall said on social media, although the race is too close to call after a preliminary count.
"Looks like Honduras is trying to change the results of their Presidential Election. If they do, there will be hell to pay!" Trump claimed on social media without providing proof of his accusation.
Full Trump Truth Social post:
"Looks like Honduras is trying to change the results of their Presidential Election. If they do, there will be hell to pay! The people of Honduras voted in overwhelming numbers on November 30th. The National Electoral Commission, the official body charged with counting the Votes, abruptly stopped counting at midnight on November 30th. Their count showed a close race between Tito Asfura and Salvador Nasralla with Asfura holding a narrow lead of 500 votes. Their tally was stopped when only 47 percent of the Vote was counted. It is imperative that the Commission finish counting the Votes. Hundreds of thousands of Hondurans must have their Votes counted. Democracy must prevail!"
Trump has become increasingly vocal about his support for allies in the region, previously threatening to cut aid to Argentina and Honduras if his picks did not win.
Ally Javier Milei was victorious in Argentina's mid-term elections.
Days before the Honduras vote, former Tegucigalpa mayor Asfura won the Republican leader's backing — as the U.S. president sought to put his finger on the scale in yet another Latin American election.
Nasralla told reporters on Monday that despite Trump's endorsement of his rival, he was confident the election would swing in his favor.
"I know I've already won. This morning, they sent me a figure that puts me ahead," he told reporters about the preliminary count.
Nasralla clarified in a post on X that "we are not declaring ourselves winners, we are just projecting the results."
The election is a clear defeat for ruling leftists trailing far behind in the vote count.
A swing to the right could help build U.S. influence in a country that under leftist government had increasingly looked to China.
The election campaign was dominated by Trump's threat and the surprise announcement that he would pardon former Honduran president Juan Orlando Hernandez of Asfura's National Party.
Hernandez is serving a 45-year prison sentence in the United States, where he had been accused of belonging to one of "the largest and most violent drug trafficking conspiracies in the world."
Some Hondurans have welcomed Trump's intervention, saying they hope it meant migrants will be allowed to remain in the United States.
Many Hondurans have fled north to escape grinding poverty and violence, including minors fearing forced recruitment by gangs.
This escape route has become more difficult since Trump's immigration crackdown, and nearly 30,000 Honduran migrants have been deported since his second term started in January.
The clampdown has dealt a severe blow to the country of 11 million people, where remittances accounted for 27% of GDP last year.
Others reject Trump's perceived meddling.
"I vote for whomever I please, not because of what Trump has said, because the truth is I live off my work, not off politicians," Esmeralda Rodriguez, a 56-year-old fruit seller, told AFP.
Michelle Pineda, a 38-year-old merchant, hoped the winner sees the country "as more than just a bag of money to loot."
Preemptive accusations of election fraud from the ruling party and opposition have sparked fears of unrest.
The vote count has progressed slowly, and final results could take days.
Lawmakers and hundreds of mayors were also elected in the fiercely polarized nation, which has swung back and forth between nominally leftist and conservative leaders.
Long a transit point for cocaine exported from Colombia to the United States, Honduras is now also a drug producer.
But the candidates barely addressed drug trafficking, poverty or violence on the campaign trail.
"I hope the new government will have good lines of communication with Trump, and that he will also support us," said Maria Velasquez, 58.
"I just want to escape poverty."