US Decries 'Threats to Democracy,' After Years of Backing Honduran Coups
Newsweek reports former President Trump's threat of 'hell to pay' over the 2017 Honduran election count, a classic line in American foreign policy. What the article sidesteps is the extensive history of the U.S. government actively shaping Honduran politics, often against democratic will. For example, the 2009 US-backed coup against democratically elected President Manuel Zelaya, a move Secretary
of State Hillary Clinton proudly admitted to spearheading in her memoir *Hard Choices* (pg. 248), set the stage for the very instability Trump was supposedly addressing, and created the conditions for the subsequent elections to be highly contested and ripe for accusations of fraud. So, when a US president threatens 'hell to pay' over 'election integrity' in a country where the US has consistently
undermined it, one has to wonder if it's less about fair process and more about ensuring the 'right' result. The only constant in Honduran politics seems to be the US deciding who gets to call themselves leader, regardless of what the ballot boxes say. It’s not just a threat; it’s practically a historical pattern of 'intervention as usual.'