First, the Trump Administration sent almost 300 people to an El Salvador prison, denying them due process. Some were Americans; most were from Venezuela.
The El Salvadorian prison is infamous.
The Center for Terrorism Confinement, to give it its full name, is considered the largest prison in the Americas – with a capacity of 40,000 inmates – and has been the biggest symbol in the Latin American country’s controversial crackdown on domestic crime.
Some 10,000 to 20,000 prisoners are currently thought to be housed there, with the most recent arrivals being the 261 people the Trump administration deported from the US over the weekend – 238 of whom it accused of belonging to the Venezuelan gang Tren de Aragua and 23 alleged members of the MS-13 gang.
El Salvador’s leader Nayib Bukele…offered to house the US deportees in Cecot as part of an unprecedented deal in which the US will pay $6 million dollars in return.
Next, Trump began bombing small boats off the coast of Venezuela, killing almost all aboard. The New York City Bar Association calls this “murder.” The Trump Administration: narco-terrorists (with no evidence for the label).
Secretary of State Marco Rubio “has portrayed the Venezuelan leader as the head of a narcotics enterprise running drugs into the United States,” according to The Atlantic. The Administration has offered no evidence for the claim.
Now, The NY Times reports that “[a]t least three U.S. military aircraft, including a heavily armed attack plane, have begun flying missions out of El Salvador’s main international airport.” This news comes at the same time that about 250 million Venezuelan immigrants have lost their temporary protected status (TPS).
The NYT calls the use of El Salvador as a staging point for US military aircraft “an expansion of the extraordinary U.S. troop buildup in the Caribbean.”
The buildup has included about 10,000 U.S. troops along with drones, bombers and nearly a dozen Navy warships, soon to be bolstered by the arrival of the aircraft carrier Gerald R. Ford. So far, the Department of Defense has reported 16 lethal strikes on boats it says were involved in drug smuggling.
The deployment to El Salvador is likely to be the first time a foreign country has hosted U.S. planes that may be involved in military strikes in the region. And it further reflects the warm ties between the Trump administration and El Salvador’s president, Nayib Bukele, who has aided President Trump’s immigration strategy by jailing deportees from the United States at a notorious maximum-security prison…
Neither Mr. Bukele’s office nor El Salvador’s Embassy in the United States responded to a request for comment about the planes’ deployment. Two U.S. military officials, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss sensitive matters, confirmed to The Times that the presence of these aircraft is related to the increase in counternarcotics missions in the region.
This is the “largest buildup in Latin America and the Caribbean since” the US invaded Panama four decades ago, according to The Guardian.
The Constitution gives Congress the power to enter or begin a war, not the president. However, on Thursday Senate Republicans voted down (49-51) a war powers resolution which would have put the kabash on war with Venezuela. Republican senators Rand Paul (KY) and Lisa Murkowski (AK) voted with the Democrats.
James Story, the top US diplomat for Venezuela from 2018 to 2023, told The Guardian that “[t]he amount of assets that have been arranged in the zone indicate to me that we’re going to do something.”
About El Salvador
Most Americans probably knew little about El Salvador before March. It’s a small, densely populated county on the South Pacific. Until recently, it had a murder rate of about 52 per 100,000 residents (in the US, it’s 6.8). More than 8% of the country’s young men are in custody, many simply on suspicion of a crime.
Its leader had the constitution amended so that he could serve a second term and has hinted at a third.
In the past, the US has “condemned [it] for undermining many democratic institutions.” Now, President Nayib Bukele (self described as the “world’s coolest dictator“) and President Donald Trump are mates.
Known for gnawing at complex questions like a terrier with a bone. Digital evangelist, writer, teacher. Transplanted Southerner; teach newbies to ride motorcycles. @kegill (Twitter and Mastodon.social); wiredpen.com