2009 Honduran coup d'état

The 2009 Honduran coup d'état, which took place during the 2009 Honduran constitutional crisis, occurred when the Honduran Army, following orders from the Honduran Supreme Court, ousted President Manuel Zelaya on 28 June 2009 and sent him into exile. Zelaya had attempted to schedule a non-binding poll to hold a referendum on convening a constituent assembly for writing a new constitution. Despite court orders to cease, Zelaya refused to comply, and the Honduran Supreme Court issued a secret arrest warrant dated 26 June. Two days later, Honduran soldiers stormed the president's house in the middle of the night, detained him, and thwarted the poll. Instead of putting him on trial, the army put him on a military plane and flew him to Costa Rica. Later that day, after reading a resignation letter of disputed authenticity, the Honduran Congress voted to remove Zelaya from office and appointed Head of Congress Roberto Micheletti, his constitutional successor, to complete his term. This was the first coup to occur in the country since 1978.

The international reaction was extensive, with the United Nations, the Organization of American States (OAS), and the European Union condemning Zelaya's removal as a military coup. On 5 July 2009, all member states of the OAS voted unanimously to suspend Honduras from the organization.

In July 2011, Honduras's Truth Commission concluded that Zelaya had violated the law by disregarding a Supreme Court ruling to cancel the referendum, but his removal from office was also deemed illegal and a coup. The Commission found that Congress' appointment of Roberto Micheletti as interim president was unconstitutional, and the resulting administration was considered a "de facto regime." The commission, chaired by former Guatemalan Vice-president Eduardo Stein, presented its report to then Honduran President Porfirio Lobo, the head of the Supreme Court, Jorge Rivera Avilez, and the Secretary General of the Organization of American States, José Miguel Insulza. In November 2021, over a decade after the coup removed Zelaya from office, his wife, former Honduran First Lady Xiomara Castro de Zelaya, was elected as the first female President of Honduras.