El Salvador’s President Nayib Bukele gestures as he delivers a speech through the inauguration of the Key Institute, a non-public establishment of upper training specializing in engineering and science in San Salvador on March 19, 2025. FILE PHOTO/Agence France-Presse
SAN SALVADOR, El Salvador — US President Donald Trump will host his El Salvador counterpart Nayib Bukele on the White Home on Monday, highlighting the central American chief’s position as a prime ally in Washington’s crackdown on undocumented immigration.
Bukele has agreed to just accept migrants deported from the USA, locking up greater than 250 in a infamous Salvadoran jail.
The overwhelming majority are Venezuelans, accused by Trump’s administration of being members of the Tren de Aragua gang, although rights organizations have decried what they referred to as “compelled disappearances and arbitrary detention.”
READ: US flies alleged gang members to El Salvador regardless of courtroom block
Relations of some deportees deny their family members are gang members.
Political scientist Napoleon Campos mentioned the assembly between Bukele and Trump had turn into oversimplified to “the difficulty of a heavy-handed safety method.”
“There are different matters that could possibly be mentioned, similar to investments and commerce, nevertheless it all comes all the way down to speaking a few jail,” he mentioned.
Trump posted on his Reality Social platform Saturday that the US and El Salvador are “working intently collectively to eradicate terrorist organizations, and construct a way forward for Prosperity.”
He added that way forward for the deported migrants in Salvadoran custody “is as much as President B and his Authorities. They’ll by no means threaten or menace our Residents once more!”
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White Home spokeswoman Karoline Leavitt mentioned Trump and Bukele “will talk about El Salvador’s partnership on utilizing their supermax jail for Tren de Aragua and MS-13 gang members and the way El Salvador’s cooperation with the USA has turn into a mannequin for others to work with this administration.”
Trump’s Homeland Safety Secretary Kristi Noem even visited the 40,000-inmate CECOT jail final month, posing in entrance of a cell overflowing with seemingly dead-eyed and closely tattooed males.
Other than political advantages for each Bukele and Trump in sending deportees to El Salvador, there’s a potential safety and financial boon for Bukele.
His authorities acquired $6 million for taking deportees, which Bukele described as “a really low price for them, however a excessive one for us.”
READ: ‘Deceived’ Venezuelans protest US deportations to El Salvador
Regardless of the partnership, El Salvador was among the many dozens of US commerce companions that the Trump administration slapped with 10 % tariffs.
The US is the primary vacation spot for Salvadoran exports. Of the practically $6.5 billion in items exported from El Salvador in 2024, $2.1 billion went to the USA, together with clothes, sugar and low, in line with the central financial institution.
“Commerce must take off, to be fluid,” economist Cesar Villalona advised AFP, predicting a fall in exports beneath the brand new tariff.
Because of this, the president of the Salvadoran Industrial Affiliation, Jorge Arriaza, hopes Bukele’s go to to the White Home will present “a bit extra readability” concerning the tariff’s implementation.
The US is house to 2.5 million Salvadorans who’re a mainstay of their native nation’s financial system.
El Salvador acquired $8.5 billion in household remittances in 2024, 23 % of the nation’s GDP.
In January and February, remittances grew 14 % in comparison with the identical interval in 2024, resulting from fears over deportation, in line with economists.
Some analysts say Bukele ought to urge Trump to melt insurance policies towards Salvadoran migrants.
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“His precedence ought to be the immigration state of affairs of Salvadorans in the USA,” tutorial Carlos Carcach advised AFP.
