The United States is sending criminals to El Salvador. What you Need to know about the CECOT Megathorm
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- The United States is sending criminals to El Salvador. What you Need to know about the CECOT Megathorm
El Salvador has begun hosting illegal migrants expelled from the United States, who are accused of membership in Latin America's most violent gangs. Criminals are housed in the world's largest prison, which has made El Salvador one of the safest countries in the world. How the leader of El Salvador, Nayib Bukele, overcame crime at home and what he himself is accused of — in the Izvestia article.
The U.S.-El Salvador Agreement
• Back in February 2025, Salvadoran President Nayib Bukele, at a meeting with US Secretary of State Marco Rubio, proposed a deal to deport criminals to the El Salvador Terrorist Detention Center (Centro de Confiramiento del Terrorismo, CECOT). Bukele's proposal concerned both illegal migrants who settled in the United States and citizens of this country convicted of serious crimes. The idea immediately received a positive response from Rubio, who noted that El Salvador could host members of well-known Latin American gangs such as Tren de Aragua and Mara Salvatrucha (also known as MS-13).
The Tren de Aragua group was formed in 2014 against the backdrop of the migration crisis in Venezuela, when tens of thousands of people fled to neighboring Latin American countries and the United States. Its strongest cells are located in Chile and Peru. The gang plays a dominant role in human trafficking in the Western Hemisphere. Its members are also involved in arms and drug trafficking, kidnapping and killing people, illegal mining, and money laundering.
• Although the deal and its parameters were not officially announced, it de facto entered into force in March. US President Donald Trump applied the Foreign Enemies Act of 1798, according to which he could quickly deport migrants from the country on the grounds that they had invaded the United States. As a result, about 250 people, natives of Venezuela and El Salvador, were expelled, sent to El Salvador and imprisoned in CECOT, which received the nickname "megaturma" in the media. Bukele announced that his country would receive $6 million for this, which is 3% of the annual budget of the penitentiary system.
• The deportation of suspects of serious crimes has caused discontent among human rights organizations in the United States. A trial was launched, during which a judge in Washington issued a temporary ban on the deportation of foreigners, according to the Foreign Enemies Act, and verbally demanded that the planes be returned to the United States. However, the migrants were still taken to El Salvador on the grounds that the order had not been issued in writing, and the planes were already over international waters.
• On April 14, Trump and Bukele met in person in Washington, discussing, among other things, the deportation of criminals. The US President thanked his colleague for accommodating migrants at CECOT and expressed the idea of sending US citizens to El Salvador as well. However, he stipulated that he would take such actions only if they turned out to be legitimate. Human rights activists were quick to declare that the US government cannot expel its own citizens, although exceptions are possible if a foreign-born holder of US citizenship is accused of terrorism or treason.
Why El Salvador?
In expert circles, El Salvador is increasingly being cited as a model for combating street crime and banditry. Over the past 10 years, this small country in Central America has risen from last place to first in the ranking of the InSight Crime analytical center on rampant crime — the number of murders per 100,000 population has fallen from 103 to 2.4.
El Salvador was known as one of the most insecure countries on the planet due to the long-running gang wars with each other and with the government. The measures resorted to by the authorities had a short-term effect, whether it was liberal easing of prison conditions or the "firm hand" of the early 2010s, when the authorities tried to strengthen the presence of law enforcement agencies on the streets. In addition, politicians often used the financing of certain gangs as a tool of their support, which created a vicious circle, and the level of robberies, murders and sexual violence only increased.
• The young president of El Salvador, Nayib Bukele, who came to power in 2019 — at that time he was 37 years old — began to fight gangs, whose influence spread to all spheres, from politics to prisons. In the early years, Bukele's strategy resembled the actions of previous administrations: police control and attempts to negotiate with imprisoned gang leaders, offering them easier conditions in exchange for reducing the degree of violence. However, criminal structures still possessed impressive strength and posed a potential threat to both citizens and the authorities.
• In March 2022, all agreements were violated, and a series of murders committed by members of the MS-13 gang swept across the country. In three days, the groups killed 87 people, including women and children. The next day, Bukele declared war on gangs, and the Government declared a state of emergency, which restricts a number of constitutional rights, allows unauthorized arrests, and extends pre-trial detention from 72 hours to 15 days. By law, the country's legislative assembly can extend the state of emergency only once for 30 days, but it is still in effect in the country.
Mara Salvatrucha, also known as MS-13, is one of the most violent and numerous gangs in Central and North America. It is active in several countries (primarily in the USA, Mexico, El Salvador, Honduras and Guatemala). The gang is divided into thousands of small territorial formations, which are easily combined to fight a common enemy. Its members are involved in drug trafficking, weapons and human trafficking, robberies, racketeering, contract killings, kidnappings for ransom, pimping, etc.
• In the first year of the emergency regime alone, according to official data, more than 60 thousand people were arrested (the population of El Salvador in 2024 is 6.6 million people), most were sent to prison without trial. This provoked outrage from human rights organizations and Western pro-liberal media, which write about the gratuitous detentions of innocent people. And although at the same time the same media and NGOs note the joy of the population and the sense of security that has appeared on the streets of the country, the emphasis is still on "disappearances, unjustified arrests." According to the latest data, the number of people arrested has approached 80,000, exceeding 1% of the population.
What is known about CECOT Prison
• In January 2023, CECOT Prison was opened in El Salvador, a terrorist detention center designed for 40,000 prisoners. Now it is the largest correctional institution in the world, previously the American Rikers Island prison was considered such — it is designed for 14 thousand prisoners.
• The prison is located on an area of 116 hectares, of which 23 hectares are occupied by the buildings of the institution. The territory is surrounded by two fences made of an electric iron grid and two reinforced concrete walls. Security is located on 19 observation towers, which stand both around the perimeter and on the territory. The complex itself consists of eight buildings, each with 32 prison cells with an area of 100 square meters. m every one. The cell is designed for more than 100 prisoners, and inside, in addition to metal bunks, there are two sinks (according to some reports, bathtubs) and two toilets. There are no windows or hoods. There is no information about the prisoners' diet or daily routine.
• According to media reports, prison conditions are extremely strict. Prisoners do not go outside, have no right to visit family members, and there are no educational or other programs. They are not allowed to read, and the time they spend outside the camera is 30 minutes a day. This is the time for sports exercises in the hallway or court sessions via video link.
• According to the Minister of Justice of El Salvador, as of August 2024, 14,5 thousand people are serving sentences in CECOT, of which 14 thousand. – members and gang leaders transferred from other maximum security prisons. According to him, about 500 more people are still under investigation. In total, 109.5 thousand people are in prisons in the country, while El Salvador ranks first in terms of the number of prisoners per 100,000 people — 1,659 prisoners per 100,000.
• After the visit of U.S. Interior Minister Kirsty Noem to El Salvador in March this year, she said it became known that Bukele plans to expand the CECOT prison, doubling the building area.
The Bukele model
• The mass arrests have only strengthened President Bukele's ratings. At the beginning of 2024, he easily won the new presidential elections, receiving a mandate for a second term, and at the end of the year, according to a CID Gallup poll, 92% of Salvadorans approved of his work. At the same time, 84% of respondents expressed confidence that the country is moving in the right direction, while only 7% said the opposite.
• Bukele calls himself the coolest dictator for a reason. Using accusations of authoritarianism from the liberal media, he highlights his success in the field that voters were most concerned about — fighting crime. In addition, he is a charismatic young leader, an active user of social media, who is not afraid to make non—standard decisions, and all this contributes to his popularity. An important factor in Bukele's success is that he positions himself as a non-systemic politician, unrelated to the former elites. Thus, the president's New Ideas party, which controls parliament, has destroyed the country's traditional two-party political system.
• The peculiarity of Bukele's policy is that he not only takes extremely harsh measures, allowing the violation of certain rights and freedoms as a "necessary evil", but also actively engaged in reforms, including in the technology sector. Back in 2021, El Salvador became the first country in the world to officially recognize bitcoin as a means of payment. At the same time, Bukele began to develop the tourism sector and attract crypto investors. Since December 2023, a program has been launched under which citizenship can be obtained for investments of $1 million in bitcoins (BTC) or USDT in the country's economy.
The extraordinary success of Bukele inevitably led neighboring countries to discuss the possibility of importing this model. The whole of Latin America suffers from street crime, but first of all, Honduras and Ecuador drew attention to El Salvador. However, the expert community notes that the President of Ecuador does not have sufficient personal popularity among the population, and the state of emergency in Honduras has not yielded results. Analysts conclude that it is impossible to solve the situation by simply copying Bukele's actions, and in El Salvador, an extraordinary combination of various factors led to success, from the youth and lack of consistency of the president to the effectiveness of punitive measures.
When preparing the material, Izvestia took into account the opinion of:
- Intern Researcher at the Center for Strategic Studies at the Institute of World Military Economics and Strategy of the National Research University Higher School of Economics
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