A former Honduran president convicted of helping to smuggle 400 tons of cocaine into the United States has left prison after being pardoned by US President Donald Trump, his wife said on Tuesday.

Juan Orlando Hernandez was released from a West Virginia prison on Monday and was “once again a free man,” his wife announced on social media. The US Bureau of Prisons website showed the release of a man matching Hernandez’s name and age.

Trump’s controversial pardon came as the US president is simultaneously ordering the bombing of boats in the Caribbean that are allegedly carrying drugs. He is also heavily backing a candidate from Hernandez’s party in Honduras’s tense, ongoing presidential election vote count.

Hernandez’s pardon came as a surprise, given Trump has made an ostensible war against Latin American drug trafficking a centerpiece in his turbulent second term.

Major US military forces are deployed in the southern Caribbean to pressure Venezuela’s leadership, which the Trump administration has designated as part of a drug cartel.