“Trump’s former campaign manager assisted the campaign of a right-wing Honduran presidential candidate who was endorsed by the American president and is now in a razor-thin contest to win the election. Brad Parscale, who ran Mr. Trump’s 2020 re-election campaign before he was replaced less than four months before the election, worked with consultants who helped run Nasry Asfura’s presidential campaign ahead of last Sunday’s election,” the New York Times reports.

“Parscale acknowledged that he advised the campaign, but said that he had nothing to do with the endorsement or the pardon.”

Donald Trump’s favored candidate, Nasry Asfura, lost his lead in Honduras’ ongoing presidential vote count, falling behind a rival Trump attacked as a “borderline communist,” Bloomberg reports.

A businessman who has President Trump’s backing for the presidency of Honduras was locked in a “technical tie” with a rightwing TV host after a preliminary vote count, CBS News reports.

Financial Times: Trump vows “hell to pay” if Honduras changes election results.

“Election authorities in Honduras announced on Sunday night that the conservative former mayor endorsed by President Trump and a sportscaster rival were virtually tied in a presidential election that many predicted would be volatile even before Mr. Trump weighed in on the race,” the New York Times reports.

“A center-left party and the far-right party of Geert Wilders were projected on Thursday morning to each win the same number of legislative seats in the Dutch election, according to the official count reported by the Dutch newswire ANP, a result that offered a strong rebuke to Mr. Wilders’s party,” the New York Times reports.

“The center-left Democrats 66, a socially progressive party with a centrist economic policy, had appeared likely to be the largest party when exit polls reported on Wednesday night.”

“Dutch voters are expected to swing back to the center in elections this week, after a two-year experiment with a government led by the far right ended in disarray,” the Financial Times reports.

“Cameroonian President Paul Biya was declared the winner of elections that were marred by allegations of irregularities, and is set to rule the central African nation until the age of 99 if he completes his eighth term,” Bloomberg reports.

“President Javier Milei’s party won Argentina’s midterm vote Sunday, a result that will give the libertarian leader a strong foothold in Congress to continue pursuing aggressive free-market policies that have won praise and a financial lifeline from Donald Trump,” Bloomberg reports.

A new poll finds Britain’s Labour Party tied with the Greens at 15%, way behind the Reform Party at 32% and the Conservatives at 17%, the Telegraph reports.

“Russia has devised a plan to intervene in elections in Moldova and disrupt the government’s efforts to keep the country on the path toward European Union membership,” Bloomberg reports.

“The multi-pronged strategy was finalized in spring and coordinated directly by the Kremlin. The goal is to undermine the chances of President Maia Sandu’s Party of Action and Solidarity in the Sept. 28 vote and ultimately see her removed from power.”

“Bolivia’s once-dominant left was swept aside in Sunday’s presidential election, with voters handing the ruling party the worst electoral defeat in two decades and all but ensuring that the next government will be led by a pro-U.S., market-friendly candidate,” the Wall Street Journal reports.

Washington Post: “For nearly two decades, politics in Bolivia has been dominated by one man: Evo Morales, acolyte of Fidel Castro and Hugo Chávez, antagonist of the United States … But the movement he built now verges on collapse.”

“The economy, now in the hands of a former protégé, is struggling through its worst crisis in decades…”

“The presidential election on Sunday could mean the end of a socialist era. Two right-leaning candidates are leading in the polls. And for the first time since Morales was elected president in 2005, neither he nor a stand-in will be on the ballot.”

“The party of El Salvador President Nayib Bukele approved constitutional changes in the country’s National Assembly on Thursday that will allow indefinite presidential reelection and extend presidential terms to six years,” the AP reports.

Secretary of State Marco Rubio ordered the State Department to “stop commenting on the fairness, integrity and legitimacy of foreign elections, a major shift away from a decadeslong practice of promoting democratic elections abroad,” the Wall Street Journal reports.

“The aim, at least in part, is to signal the U.S. is less interested in pressuring foreign governments to make internal reforms, such as allowing competitive elections, that has been a hallmark of U.S. foreign policy under both parties since the Cold War.”

“Polls open on Sunday in Japan, where half of the seats in its Upper House of Parliament will be contested in the first national election since Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba took office last year,” the New York Times reports.

“The emergence of right-wing populist parties that appeal to younger voters has threatened the long-governing Liberal Democratic Party and its coalition partner, with polls showing they could lose seats, and perhaps even their majority, in the chamber.”

Financial Times: “Japan’s ruling bloc led by the Liberal Democratic party is in danger of losing its majority in both houses of parliament for the first time in 15 years as a backlash led by first-time voters, inflation-strained households and savvy social media campaigners hits traditional politics.”

Anne Applebaum: “A nationalist’s narrow victory in Poland offers a preview of many knife-edge contests to come, all across the democratic world.”