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President Alejandro Giammattei was deeply unpopular at home, but other than occasional statements of reprobation from the United States and Europe, had managed to consolidate his control of the justice system with little consequence.

He was warm in his reprobation of Mr. Elton’s conduct; it had been unpardonable rudeness; and Mrs. Elton’s looks also received the due share of censure.

Throughout there was a strange bitterness; an absence of consolatory gentleness; stern allusions to Calvinistic doctrines—election, predestination, reprobation—were frequent; and each reference to these points sounded like a sentence pronounced for doom.

Constant fact-checking and reprobation by mainstream media outlets and good-government groups have not budged that number.

He singled out China and Russia for reprobation after working here to enlist U.S. allies in what he has repeatedly cast as the existential battle of the 21st century.