From Sen. Tim Kaine on one of the latest outrages by the utterly corrupt Donald Trump – this time, pardoning “Juan Orlando Hernández, the former president of Honduras who is serving a 45-year prison sentence in the US on drug trafficking and weapons charges.” As Sen. Kaine says, “This is a disgusting and incomprehensible decision by Trump, and Americans whose lives have been destroyed by narcotraffickers like Ulbricht and Hernández deserve better.”
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KAINE STATEMENT ON TRUMP’S PARDONING OF FORMER HONDURAN PRESIDENT WHO BROUGHT OVER 400 TONS OF COCAINE INTO THE UNITED STATES
WASHINGTON, D.C. – Today, U.S. Senator Tim Kaine (D-VA), who lived in Honduras in 1980 and 1981 and serves as Ranking Member of the Senate Foreign Relations Subcommittee on the Western Hemisphere, released the following statement regarding President Donald Trump’s decision to pardon drug kingpin and former Honduran President Juan Orlando Hernández, who was convicted in the U.S. in 2024 for conspiring to traffic more than 400 tons of cocaine and weapons charges and sentenced to 45 years in prison:
“Since September, President Trump has struck over 20 boats in the Caribbean and eastern Pacific Ocean in a supposed effort to crack down on drug trafficking—ordering the illegal execution of unknown people without evidence or trials and forfeiting the ability to gather valuable intelligence. But he finds it perfectly acceptable to excuse rich guys like Russ Ulbricht, who was sentenced to life in prison after founding the world’s largest online drug marketplace, and now Juan Orlando Hernández, who allegedly said he wanted to ‘shove the drugs right up the noses of the gringos by flooding the United States with cocaine’ and was sentenced to 45 years after bringing 400 tons of it into America. It’s the same old story from this Administration: no plans to actually make our communities safer or more prosperous, only ridiculous—and likely corrupt—schemes to reward wealthy criminals. This is a disgusting and incomprehensible decision by Trump, and Americans whose lives have been destroyed by narcotraffickers like Ulbricht and Hernández deserve better.”
According to the U.S. Department of Justice, court documents illustrated that from at least in or about 2004, up to and including in or about 2022, Hernández was at the center of one of the largest and most violent drug-trafficking conspiracies in the world. During his political career, Hernández abused his powerful positions and authority in Honduras to facilitate the importation of over 400 tons of cocaine into the U.S. Hernández’s co-conspirators were armed with machine guns and destructive devices, including AK-47s, AR-15s, and grenade launchers, which they used to protect their massive cocaine loads as they transited across Honduras on their way to the U.S., protect the money they made from the eventual sale of this cocaine, and guard their drug-trafficking territory from rivals.
In 2017, Trump recognized Hernández as the winner of a presidential election in Honduras despite widespread allegations of fraud. Hernández was losing the election until election authorities stopped releasing results and ultimately declared that he won another term. Honduras is due to hold presidential elections on November 30; international observers have raised concerns regarding the potential integrity of the elections after the country’s March 9 primaries were fraught with irregularities.
The day after Trump was inaugurated in 2025, he pardoned Ulbricht, who was serving life in prison for convictions relating to distributing narcotics and conspiring to launder money tied to his website, Silk Road. Kaine railed against the decision.
