Despite corruption scandals and ongoing political instability stemming from a post-election crisis that was never resolved, the US has stood by President Hernández. Honduras was the home base for US counterinsurgency operations and regional military training in Central America during the Cold War...Home to the only US Southern Command joint task force in Latin America, with the exception of Guantanamo, and to several forward operating bases used by US forces, Honduras maintains its pivotal importance to the US in Central America. US government and military officials recently reiterated their support for President Hernández' administration. On January 22, US Vice President Mike Pence called Hernández to “reiterate the strong and collaborative relationship” between the two countries and commend the Honduran president on his response to recent migrant caravans.

“Tell Mom not to worry – I’m applying for asylum,” Espinal, 28, told his sister Patricia, who recounted the December phone call with tears streaming down her sun-scarred cheeks. “We must pray to God that they give it to me. I told them I can’t go back to Honduras because if I go back, they’re going to kill me.” Within weeks of reaching the US, however, he was deported back to his gang-infested neighborhood in the Honduran capital Tegucigalpa – and the death threats that had prompted him to flee. But just over a week after his return, Nelson was shot dead on the street outside his home on 18 December 2018.

Journalist David Romero Ellner, director of Radio Globo, and another group of journalists from the same media outlet, were sued in 2014 by former public prosecutor Sonia Inés Gálvez, wife of the former assistant attorney general of the Republic of Honduras, Rigoberto Cuellar. As a result of that suit, Romero was convicted in a criminal court for six crimes of defamation and injuria. The journalist appealed, but the magistrates of the Criminal Chamber of the Supreme Court of Justice unanimously confirmed the sentence issued in 2016.

US briefly shuts crossing and fires teargas to repel groups of people including children