The Trump administration’s agreement with El Salvador to detain alleged criminal gang members has been made public for the first time, as part of a lawsuit challenging the use of the Alien Enemies Act (AEA).
Under the agreement, El Salvador was paid $4.76 million to house 300 immigrants accused of being part of the Venezuelan gang Tren de Aragua (TdA) at its CECOT high-security prison, as long as certain conditions were met, including not assisting asylum seekers.
The document was released by Democracy Forward, one of the groups suing the U.S. Department of State, alongside Robert F. Kennedy Human Rights, for the use of the AEA to speedily deport alleged illegal immigrants earlier this year.
Newsweek reached out to the U.S. Department of State and Homeland Security, and El Salvador’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs for comment via contact form and email on Tuesday.
Why It Matters
The Trump administration’s use of the AEA to quickly deport alleged TdA members was challenged in court in March, with plaintiffs arguing that immigrants were being denied their right to due process – or a full court hearing – before being removed from the U.S. The use of El Salvador’s CECOT prison was denounced by human rights groups and Democrats in Congress for its reputation as a place where prisoners were tortured and never released.
What To Know
Democracy Forward and RFK Human Rights said they secured the release of the agreement following efforts by the federal government to keep it out of public view.
The document, from the Ministry of Foreign Relations in El Salvador, showed that initially the deportees would be held for up to a year at CECOT, unless another decision was made on their detention.
Under the $4.76 million agreement, El Salvador had to agree to only use the funds for the holding of the alleged gang members, and not to give any of it to a third party. It specifically stated that money should not make its way into the hands of those linked to criminal activities.
The document, dated March 22, 2025, said the agreement had been reached on March 14, the day before two flights carrying U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) detainees left the U.S. for El Salvador, despite a court hearing being underway at the time which resulted in a ruling seeking to halt the flights.
Among those on board was Kilmar Abrego Garcia, a Salvadoran man the administration later admitted had been deported because of an administrative error, and several Venezuelan nationals who had not had their day in immigration court.
On March 22, the Department of State paid El Salvador the money agreed, while legal challenges around the deportations were continuing in U.S. courts.
The White House insisted that those who were sent to CECOT were known gang members and violent criminals, and insisted that the U.S. did not have the power to bring them back.
Later, under an agreement between the U.S., El Salvador, and Venezuela, the U.S. deportees held at the prison were released back to Venezuela.
What People Are Saying
Skye Perryman, President and CEO of Democracy Forward, in a press release: “While the American people should not be required to go to court to secure this information, we are pleased that our litigation led to this important information being released.
“The correspondence between the U.S. State Department and El Salvador confirms what we have long suspected: the Trump-Vance administration did nothing to meaningfully ensure that individuals disappeared from the U.S. to El Salvador’s notorious CECOT prison were protected from torture, indefinite confinement, or other abuses. The agreement did, however, go to lengths to ensure that the funds the U.S. provided to El Salvador not be used to provide reproductive health care or to assist asylum seekers in accessing resources and counsel.”
El Salvador’s President Nayib Bukele, in a post on X in February: “We are willing to take in only convicted criminals (including convicted U.S. citizens) into our mega-prison (CECOT) in exchange for a fee. The fee would be relatively low for the U.S. but significant for us, making our entire prison system sustainable.”
What Happens Next
The lawsuit continues in the District of Columbia, while the use of the Alien Enemies Act to deport Venezuelans from the U.S. remains blocked by a federal appeals court.
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