Do You Know About This Place?

Kate Gace Walton

09 Jan 2026 — 1 min read

Image: Próspera, a techno-libertarian experiment in governance, located in Honduras. Photo sourced via Wikimedia.

The fact that Trump pardoned one drug-trafficking strongman (Hernández of Honduras) one month before capturing another (Maduro of Venezuela) has been much discussed.

Also much discussed: Venezuela’s oil, Trump’s embrace of the Monroe Doctrine, Trump’s love of made-for-TV displays of dominance, and his need to distract Americans from healthcare costs and the Epstein files.

What has not been mentioned much in the reporting I’ve consumed is Próspera, the private charter city in Honduras backed by tech investors Peter Thiel, Balaji Srinivasan, and Marc Andreessen. Próspera is (quite literally) a libertarian dream come true: minimal taxation, minimal regulation, and an opt-in legal system. The development of Próspera was championed, before his arrest in 2022, by (wait for it) the former president of Honduras, the newly-pardoned Juan Orlando Hernández.

I’m not saying that Próspera is in its own right a major story to consider at this moment. It’s not. I’m just saying that “the hypocrisy” is not random, and that my Venn Diagram from late last year is at least part of the answer to the refrain “make it make sense.”

My utopia is pluralistic, with a focus on equal opportunity and equal protection before the law. For others—at least three distinct groups of others—the dream is no constraints.

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