Trump Has Deported Over 200 Venezuelans Who Are Allegedly Gang Members To El Salvador’s Mega Prison

US President Donald Trump has deported more than 200 Venezuelan immigrants, who are alleged gang members, to be jailed in El Salvador’s mega prison. 

The deportation comes after El Salvador’s President, Nayib Bukele, offered to take in criminals and migrants deported by the US and jail them in its notorious mega-prison, CECOT.

On Friday March 15, Trump signed an executive order invoking a wartime law to deport Venezuelans allegedly linked to the Venezuelan gang, Tren de Aragua. 

The Alien Enemies Act grants US presidents the ability to deport non-citizens without a court hearing during wartime and has been used only three times, including during World War I and II.

On Saturday, a US federal judge ordered the Trump administration to stop deportations and gave a verbal order to turn around all deportation flights, according to the BBC.

However, flight information showed that the airplanes were already outside of the US by the time the judge issued his order. 

Officials under the Trump administration told Axios that as the flights “were already outside of US airspace”, they believed “the order is not applicable”.

“Oopsies…too late,” Bukele wrote on X.

 On Sunday, March 16, Bukele shared on social media that El Salvador received 238 alleged members Tren de Aragua, along with 23 alleged members of the Salvadoran gang, MS-13.

However, a senior administration official told CBS news that out of the 238 deported Venezuelans, only 137 of them were deported through the Alien Enemies Act for alleged gang ties to Tren de Aragua.

An ICE official told court “many” of the members deported under the Alien Enemies Act “do not have criminal records in the United States” because they have only been in the country “for a short period of time”.

“The lack of a criminal record does not indicate they pose a limited threat,” the ICE official added.

The US and El Salvador have not given any details about the people deported or why, besides their alleged gang affiliation.

Venezuela criticized Trump for the deportations, saying that the move "unjustly criminalizes Venezuelan migration" and "evokes the darkest episodes in the history of humanity, from slavery to the horror of the Nazi concentration camps".

The head of Venezuela’s parliament said that the people deported were not known to have committed any crimes in the US or in El Salvador, and the country would do everything it can to return them home, Reuters reported.

Trump’s move has also been condemned by human rights groups, who say he used a 227-year-old law to deport people without a proper process.

Bukele said that the people deported would be held in CECOT for one year, which could be renewable.

The US has said it paid El Salvador US$6 million to detain around 300 people.

CECOT, which opened in 2023 as part of Bukele’s plan to crack down on gang violence in the country, is the largest prison in Latin America and can house approximately 40,000 inmates.

Access to CECOT has been limited, which human rights organizations say makes it hard to verify the conditions of the prison. 

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