Shortly after the Trump administration deported hundreds of Venezuelans to El Salvador this weekend, the Salvadoran president, Nayib Bukele, posted a three-minute video on social media. It featured shackled men being marched off a plane over a dramatic electronic soundtrack and into prison, where they were shaved bald.
Mr. Bukele also taunted the U.S. judge who unsuccessfully ordered the flights turned around, posting on X, “Oopsie … Too late,” with a laughing emoji. Secretary of State Marco Rubio shared the video, as did Elon Musk. Mr. Trump thanked Mr. Bukele online, saying, “We will not forget!”
El Salvador’s role in the Trump administration’s deportation strategy signals a new level of power and global visibility for Mr. Bukele, who became president at 37 in 2019 and was re-elected by a landslide last year.
He has become Latin America’s most popular leader for his takedown of gangs, even as he has suspended key civil liberties and has been accused by U.S. prosecutors of secretly negotiating with the same gangs. He is now positioning himself as a crucial regional ally to Mr. Trump.
The world’s ‘coolest dictator’
Mr. Bukele uses social media to project a slick and casual look — often wearing a backward baseball cap and aviator shades — and to respond to criticism of his iron-fisted approach to crime and violence.
In spring 2022, after a surge in gang violence rocked El Salvador, the government imposed a state of emergency that has been in place ever since. Mr. Bukele empowered police and the military forces to carry out mass arrests, which human rights groups say have ensnared without due process people who have no gang ties.
Many of the 85,000 Salvadorans apprehended have disappeared into the prison system, held for years without trial and without their families knowing if they are alive.
Mr. Bukele has also been accused of undermining democratic institutions. He has embraced the criticism, referring to himself as the world’s “coolest dictator.”
Adding to his tough-on-crime persona are the highly produced videos and photos that his government regularly releases. They feature shirtless men in handcuffs or prisoners working in factory-like conditions. And they often include footage from the forbidding Terrorism Confinement Center, known as CECOT, a hulking site that can house up to 40,000 inmates.
An alliance with Trump
Mr. Bukele’s embrace of emergency security powers and his promotion of the cryptocurrency Bitcoin have earned him praise in Mr. Trump’s inner circle.
He was given a standing ovation at the conservative CPAC event last year and recently met with Mr. Musk at a Tesla plant in Texas.
Last month, Mr. Bukele took Mr. Rubio on a sun-drenched tour of the presidential residence outside San Salvador. Afterward, Mr. Rubio announced that Mr. Bukele had offered to take in deportees of any nationality, including Americans, and to house them in CECOT — for a fee.
Included in that group, Mr. Rubio said, would be “any illegal alien in the United States who is a criminal of any nationality, whether from MS-13 or the Tren de Aragua,” the Salvadoran and Venezuelan gangs.
A White House spokeswoman said on Monday that El Salvador would receive $6 million for taking in the Venezuelan deportees, who the U.S. government said were members of Tren de Aragua, without offering evidence or the detainees’ names.
The deportation created panic among Venezuelan families, who feared their relatives were among those handed over to the Salvadoran authorities.
Bringing MS-13 members back
The day after Mr. Rubio’s announcement, the Salvadoran ambassador to Washington, Milena Mayorga, said Mr. Bukele had asked to include MS-13 leaders among those deported to El Salvador, “as a matter of honor.”
“The president was blunt and told Rubio: I want you to send me the gang leaders who are in the United States,” Ms. Mayorga said.
The deportees also included two Salvadoran men described by Mr. Rubio as “dangerous top MS-13 leaders.”
Mr. Bukele’s relationship to MS-13 — which began in El Salvador but has spread through Latin America and the United States — is complicated.
Under the Biden administration, the Department of Justice accused Mr. Bukele and his administration of secretly negotiating a pact with certain gang leaders: In exchange for helping keep down homicide numbers, Salvadoran officials offered them privileges behind bars, the department said.
Top Salvadoran officials, the Justice Department said, also helped an MS-13 boss escape the country even though the United States had requested his extradition.
In 2021, the Treasury Department imposed sanctioned against members of the administration for doling out favors to gang leaders. Mr. Bukele and members of his administration were named in U.S. indictments of MS-13 leaders.
Mr. Bukele has denied making a deal with gang leaders.
Though his popularity has soared, some analysts say the Salvadoran leader may be fearful of losing his grip on power if his alleged collaboration with gang leaders were to fully come to light.
Mr. Bukele said the deportees would be held for at least a year and made to perform labor and attend workshops under a program called “Zero Idleness.”
In announcing the arrival of this weekend’s flights, he called them “the first.”
Gabriel Labrador contributed reporting from San Salvador.
