Ex-Honduras first lady announces run for presidency days after husband’s drug trafficking conviction

TEGUCIGALPA, Honduras (AP) — Former Honduras first lady Ana García de Hernández said Tuesday, just days after her husband’s U.S. drug trafficking conviction, that she plans to seek the country’s presidency next year.

Ex-President Juan Orlando Hernández was convicted of conspiring with drug traffickers moving tons of cocaine to the United States in a federal court in Manhattan Friday.

On Tuesday, his wife said in a news conference: “I want to tell you that from this moment I will start an active and proactive fight for the world to know the injustice that was committed.” She said she would do so by seeking the nomination of Hernández’s National party.

Hernández, who maintained his innocence throughout his trial, could be sentenced to life in prison.

“I know what has to be done, I know the job, I know the dedication and the fight my husband has had every day and I know Honduras’ great needs, and one of the greatest is the injustice we’ve just seen,” García de Hernández said.

Marco Eliud Girón, a lawmaker from the ruling LIBRE party, said that García de Hernández could run, but asserted that she surely knew of her husband’s ties to drug traffickers. He suggested her entry into politics had more to do with reducing her own legal exposure.

Hernández was arrested at his home in Tegucigalpa, the Honduran capital, three months after leaving office in 2022 and was extradited to the U.S. in April of that year.