El Salvador, a country in central America, has entered into a groundbreaking agreement with the Trump administration to accept deportees of any nationality, including violent criminals from the United States, in a move that has sparked concern among rights groups and policy analysts.
The deal was unveiled by U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio on Monday following discussions with Salvadoran President Nayib Bukele.
Rubio, who is touring several Central American nations to advance the White House’s migration policies, described the agreement as unparalleled in scope.
“In an act of extraordinary friendship to our country … (El Salvador) has agreed to the most unprecedented and extraordinary migratory agreement anywhere in the world,” Rubio stated during a press briefing.
As part of the arrangement, El Salvador will continue to take back its own citizens deported from the U.S. for unlawful entry.
However, the agreement goes further, requiring the country to also “accept for deportation any illegal alien in the United States who is a criminal from any nationality, be they MS-13 or Tren de Aragua and house them in his jails,” Rubio explained, referencing two infamous transnational gangs with roots in El Salvador and Venezuela.
Additionally, Bukele has committed to housing dangerous criminals in U.S. custody, including American citizens and legal residents, within Salvadoran prisons.
Confirming the deal, Bukele posted on X: “We are willing to take in only convicted criminals (including convicted U.S. citizens) into our mega-prison (CECOT) in exchange for a fee.”
“The fee would be relatively low for the U.S. but significant for us, making our entire prison system sustainable,” he added.
Critics argue that the agreement raises serious legal and ethical questions.
An international politics scholar at Emerson College, Mneesha Gellman, cautioned that the U.S. is essentially outsourcing the detention of criminals to a country that may have no legal connection to them.
“The US is essentially proposing to send people to a country that is not the country of origin nor is it necessarily the country that they passed through,” she said.
“It is a bizarre and unprecedented proposal being made potentially between two authoritarian, populist, right wing leaders seeking a transactional relationship,” she continued, warning that such a deal could violate international laws protecting migrant rights.
One major concern is that under El Salvador’s ongoing state of emergency, authorities have broad powers to detain individuals based on mere suspicion of gang affiliation.
Human rights organizations, including Amnesty International, have criticized the country’s incarceration policies, arguing that many of the more than 80,000 people imprisoned under the emergency decree are likely innocent.
With El Salvador already holding the world’s highest incarceration rate, the implications of this agreement remain deeply contentious.
