U.S. Role in Honduras Narco-State Absent from President's Drug Trial | Under the Shadow Update 3

Former president Juan Orlando Hernández has been convicted of drug trafficking. The United States and Canada remain unaccountable.

March 26, 2024

President Juan Orlando Hernández greets a U.S. Marine at the Soto Cano air base in Honduras, June 21, 2019. (U.S. Marine Corps photo by Cpl. Stanley Moy)

 

Read the transcript.

A New York court has found former Honduran president Juan Orlando Hernández guilty of drug trafficking and weapons possession. It’s a huge verdict that will likely see the former president imprisoned for life.

In the last episode of Under The Shadow, host Michael Fox looked deeply at Hernández’s time as president from 2014 to 2022, which many came to call a narco-dictatorship. He won office in a fraudulent election, consolidated unprecedented power, pushed a neoliberal sell-off, and carried out widespread human rights abuses. 

In this Update 3, Fox looks at the New York trial that convicted him. What went down, what it meant, and what it means going forward for Honduras. And most important, what was missing—namely the role of the United States and Canada in propping up the Hernández regime.

For this update, we speak with Karen Spring, the co-coordinator of the Honduras Solidarity Network and host of the Honduras Now podcast. She was in the New York courtroom throughout Hernandez’s trial.

Under the Shadow is an investigative narrative podcast series that walks back in time, to tell the story of the past by visiting momentous places in the present. 

In each episode, host Michael Fox takes us to a location where something historic happened—a landmark of revolutionary struggle or foreign intervention. Today, it might look like a random street corner, a church, a mall, a monument or a museum. But every place he takes us was once the site of history-making events that shook countries, impacted lives, and left deep marks on the world.

Hosted by Latin America-based journalist Michael Fox.
Recorded in San Salvador, El Salvador.

This podcast is produced in partnership between The Real News Network and NACLA.

Guests: Karen Spring
Theme music by Monte Perdido. Other music from Blue Dot Sessions.

Follow and support journalist Michael Fox or Under the Shadow at https://www.patreon.com/mfox

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