Apps

Xiomara Castro — news, coverage & facts — IJR

Presidential campaigns

On 1 July 2012, Castro officially launched her presidential campaign at an event in the department of Santa Barbara. She then won her party's primary on 18 November 2012, and on 16 June 2013, she was officially chosen to represent Libre in the 2013 presidential election. She expressed opposition to neoliberalism and the militarization of society, and she campaigned for a constituent assembly to write a new constitution

Leading up to the election, she was first in the polls among all eight candidates during the months of March through October. However, in the final poll before the election, she fell to second place, behind the President of the National Congress, Juan Orlando Hernández of the National Party of Honduras. Castro and Hernández were widely seen as the two leading candidates going into the election. She came in second behind Hernández with 896,498 votes (28.78%) to Hernández's 1,149,302 (36.89%). This was the first time the Libre party outperformed either the National or the Liberal Party, as Libre won the second most seats in Congress.

For the 2017 presidential election, Castro again sought to be Libre's nominee. She easily won the primary, but when Libre formed an alliance with the Innovation and Unity Party, she agreed to step aside and let Salvador Nasralla lead the alliance's presidential ticket.

The Alliance won the election in the pre-election polls, and led in the preliminary results. However, a general blackout interrupted the publication of the count for 36 hours; when it was restarted, the trend was reversed and President Juan Orlando Hernández was re-elected, leading to accusations of fraud. The ensuing demonstrations were suppressed by the government, leaving 23 people dead, hundreds injured and more than 1,350 detained.

Castro was chosen as the 2021 presidential candidate for Libre and represented her political party in the 2021 Honduran general election. Salvador Nasralla, a presidential candidate for the Savior Party, later dropped out and became Castro's running mate. Polls showed a tight race between Castro and her right-wing opponent Nasry Asfura, of the incumbent National Party, a two-term mayor plagued by allegations of corruption. During her presidential campaign, she suggested the diplomatic recognition of the People's Republic of China in Beijing over the Republic of China on Taiwan (see One-China policy), the establishment of an anti-corruption commission backed by the United Nations similar to the one active in Guatemala and an update to the Honduran Constitution. Castro has proposed a constituent assembly to rewrite the Constitution of Honduras. She has also suggested easing the country's complete prohibition of abortion, under limited circumstances, and allow the use and distribution of emergency contraception.

Following the release of the preliminary results of the election on 29 November, Castro declared victory, and was described by international media as the apparent victor of the election, pending full results. The next day, Asfura's party conceded defeat. He then met with Castro and congratulated her. Castro became Honduras' first female president on 27 January 2022.

Economic policy

In her inaugural speech, Castro vowed to re-found a democratic socialist state, stating she had a duty to restore an economic system based upon transparency, efficiency of production, social justice in the distribution of wealth and in national income, and that her vision of her world puts the human being before the rules of the market.

In February 2022, she intervened in a dispute with a businessman over the ownership of a large piece of land south of the capital. The businessman, who owned the land under Honduras law, intended to evict indigenous people to build homes for 10,000 Hondurans; she intervened to stop the eviction, citing indigenous wellbeing over rule of law.

She banned open-pit mining in March 2022 due to the extensive damage to the environment. The government also promised to intervene "immediately" to conserve areas of "high environmental value" for the benefit of the population.

In May 2022, Castro began a measure passed by Congress to abolish Honduras' special economic zones, which the previous National government implemented.

In May 2023, the government introduced a law reforming the tax system, termed Ley de Justicia Tributaria (LJT). The government stated the law is designed to eliminate tax loopholes and privileges for certain economic sectors. The bill was met with protests by melon farmers and shrimpers inside the country, because it entails a revocation of tax rebates for these industries.

At her state visit to the People's Republic of China in Shanghai in June 2023, Castro applied for Honduran membership in the New Development Bank, also called BRICS Development Bank, as this would boost the economic development and raise living standards in her country.

During her term in office, Castro has achieved some economic growth and brought inflation under control. Her greatest successes have been a 13.5-point reduction in poverty.

In a bid to combat poverty, Castro announced during her inauguration that the poorest families in Honduras, those that consume under 150kWh per month of electricity, will no longer pay electricity bills, and that the additional cost of this policy will be paid for by the biggest consumers assuming an extra charge on their bills. In addition, Castro also announced that her government would send a decree to the National Congress of Honduras to achieve a fuel subsidy, and vowed no more concessions in the exploitation of rivers, hydrographic basins and national parks.

In her inaugural address, Castro announced to the nation that the largest base of the budget she will present to parliament is dedicated to salaries and wages. In-addition, Castro stated that she had ordered her Minister of Finance and the Central Bank to take action to reduce interest rates for production.

On 25 November 2022, a state of emergency was declared to deal with crime.

Initially instituted for forty-five days in two municipalities, Tegucigalpa and San Pedro Sula, the state of exception has been renewed and extended to more than half of the country's cities. The government strengthened police resources, built several high-security prisons, authorized the deployment of security forces in the streets, and authorized the deployment of military forces in the streets to support the police.

The homicide rate has fallen from 38 per 100,000 inhabitants in 2022 to 31 in 2023, a drop of 17%. However, according to some specialists, the reduction in crime is not directly linked to the state of emergency. The government's security policy is also hampered by blockages in Parliament, where Xiomara Castro's party does not hold a majority.

In 2025, the homicide rate is the lowest in thirty years, according to data from the independent organization ACLED (Armed Conflict Location and Event Data), and has been reduced by more than half in large cities such as San Pedro Sula and the capital Tegucigalpa.

Foreign policy

In February 2022, Deputy Foreign Minister Gerardo Torres Zelaya held a meeting with Sahrawi President Brahim Ghali, which concluded with an announcement that diplomatic relations between the peoples and governments of Honduras and the SADR had been restored and would be deepened.

During her campaign, Castro promised to change Honduras' allegiance from the Republic of China (Taiwan) to the People's Republic of China if elected. Taiwanese Vice President Lai Ching-te attended Castro's inauguration. On 14 March 2023, Castro instructed her foreign minister to move to cut ties with Taiwan in order to establish formal relations with the People's Republic of China as the sole Chinese state. At the end of March, Honduras and the PRC formally established diplomatic ties and appointed ambassadors to their respective capitals.

Retired Taiwanese Kuomintang opposition member Tsai Cheng-yuan posted on social media that this move was a result of Taiwan refusing to shelter Castro during the 2009 coup. Castro for her part cited U.S. interventionism and pressure, especially in regards to Taiwan in Central America, as motives to open diplomatic relations with the People's Republic of China.

Shortly following Castro's inauguration, an event attended by representatives of the Nicolás Maduro government, the Venezuelan embassy in Tegucigalpa was vacated by representatives of Juan Guaidó, who had been recognised as the President of Venezuela by outgoing President Juan Orlando Hernández since the Venezuelan presidential crisis. As a result, the embassy was recovered by the Venezuelan delegation sent by the Maduro government. Former President and First Gentleman Manuel Zelaya responded to the news by sending a tweet welcoming Maduro, Latin American unity and the Bolivarian Revolution. Soon after, the Foreign Minister of Venezuela, Félix Plasencia, and newly appointed Foreign Minister of Honduras Enrique Reina announced the restoration of diplomatic relations between the two nations for the first time since 2009, when they were severed shortly after the coup. The restoration of diplomatic relations was followed by Honduran accreditation of the Venezuelan ambassador Margaud Godoy by Foreign Minister Reina, who said that if the United States had any uncertainty about Honduras' position, reestablishment of relations with Venezuela "for Honduras is a matter of sovereign foreign policy".

In January 2026, Castro condemned the United States' military intervention in Venezuela, which resulted in the capture of Nicolás Maduro.

Castro announced the recall of the Honduran ambassador from Israel on 4 November 2023, shortly after the country's ministry of foreign affairs stated that "Honduras energetically condemns the genocide and serious violations of international humanitarian law that the civilian Palestinian population is suffering in the Gaza Strip".

The United Nations General Assemblies (UN) are held in New York every September.

In her first speech before the UN, the president of Honduras, Xiomara Castro, demanded that Honduras's sovereignty and independence be respected by developed countries: "do not continue trying to destabilize Honduras, and dictate your measures or choose with whom we should relate", she said. She also held them responsible for environmental deterioration and for their participation in wars and financial crises: "This arbitrary world order, in which there are third- and fourth-rate countries, is unacceptable to us". In that context, she assured that her government would defend the environment. Castro blamed the United States for supporting a "narco-dictatorship" in the Central American country during the previous twelve years, in reference to the 12 years during which the right-wing National Party of Honduras held political power before the socialist Liberty and Refoundation Party, to which Castro belongs, came to office. The president referred to her predecessor, Juan Orlando Hernández, who at the time was facing trial for complicity in drug trafficking:

In Honduras we cannot continue sustaining the hypocrisy of a system that judges for crimes linked to drug trafficking the person whom, nevertheless, they backed and supported for more than a decade in the commission of crimes, two electoral frauds, and crimes against the homeland against millions of Hondurans.

Finally, she announced that she would establish relations with China and advocated for the regimes of Cuba and Venezuela:

We proclaim the return to the self-determination of peoples, rejecting the infamous and brutal blockade against the people of our sister Republic of Cuba. The aggression against the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela must end.

For the second time, President Castro defended socialist regimes in Latin America:

We condemn the long blockade against Cuba and against Venezuela; likewise, we demand Cuba's removal from the list of countries classified as terrorists, because it is a manipulated, false and arbitrary measure... Unfair measures and sanctions against Nicaragua must also be removed, because they are barriers preventing us from normalizing our relations with our sister country.

Without mentioning Russia, she blamed global economic interests in Ukraine, in addition to recalling her opening of relations with China. She also referred to the situation in her country, accusing the political opposition and civil-society organizations of conspiring against her government, and specifically against the election of an attorney general. The accusation fell especially on the Citizen Opposition Bloc (BOC), an ephemeral coalition that sought to influence that election and which was made up of three opposition political parties: the major National Party and Liberal Party, and the Salvador of Honduras Party, to which Castro's main political ally and vice president, Salvador Nasralla, belonged. As achievements of her government, Castro said she had achieved a "reduction in extortion" and in homicides, pointing to the implementation of a state of exception. She also said that she had ordered "the greatest increase in the budget of the social sectors" and recalled the repeal of the ZEDEs (Zones for Employment and Economic Development) that Congress approved: "We repealed the ZEDE Law that split Honduran territory into 17 pieces to hand it over to 25 economic groups". Finally, she referred to the process of installing an International Commission against Corruption and Impunity in Honduras (CICIH):

I have delivered to the Secretary-General of the United Nations the official proposal of the agreement for the establishment of the CICIH, impartial, autonomous and independent. With the capacity to investigate and prosecute cases of high-impact corruption networks and financial crimes.

President Xiomara Castro began her speech by saying: "Today I am threatened by the same forces of capital that 15 years ago carried out a coup d'état against President Manuel Zelaya", accusing "the ten most powerful families in Honduras" of plotting against her. According to her speech, the destabilization attempts arose in response to her attempt to promote "structural changes to the economic model", specifically a new tax law that would no longer "perpetuate inequality". Castro again alleged interference in her country, maintaining what she had said days earlier when, under the same accusations, she decided to cancel the extradition treaty between her country and the United States (see: Xiomara Castro administration: foreign policy):

Our sovereignty is the fundamental basis and an undeclinable principle of international relations, but in Honduras colonial practices, interference, and economic, media and political domination continue to be imposed.

Castro said she had achieved in Honduras a "historic decrease of 15 points in homicides, the greatest reduction in the last 20 years". She repudiated the murder of environmentalist Juan López and said she had ordered that "the full capacity of the security forces" be used to capture those responsible. She also mentioned the delivery of a second draft agreement for the establishment of the CICIH and the by-then-defunct ZEDEs, declared unconstitutional by the Supreme Court after the National Congress did not ratify their repeal:

The international ZEDE project that sold our territory piece by piece as spoils for international capital, approved by stateless actors in the previous narco-regime, has been definitively cancelled by my government of democratic socialism.

Finally, she again advocated for Nicaragua and Venezuela, and against the United States embargo against Cuba. She condemned the genocide against Palestine and the recent Israeli attacks in Lebanon, hoping that it would not become a new Gaza Strip.