El Salvador to accept US deportees of any nationality, including imprisoned Americans, in unprecedented deal

El Salvador has agreed to receive deportees from the United States of any nationality, including violent criminals who are US citizens currently imprisoned, in an unprecedented deal that has alarmed critics and rights groups.

El Salvador has agreed to receive deportees from the United States of any nationality, including violent criminals who are US citizens currently imprisoned, in an unprecedented deal that has alarmed critics and rights groups. US Secretary of State Marco Rubio announced the agreement on Monday after meeting with Salvadoran President Nayib Bukele, as he visits several Central American countries to drive forward the Trump administration’s agenda on migration. “In an act of extraordinary friendship to our country … (El Salvador) has agreed to the most unprecedented and extraordinary migratory agreement anywhere in the world,” Rubio told reporters. The country will continue accepting Salvadoran deportees who illegally entered the US, he said. It will also “accept for deportation any illegal alien in the United States who is a criminal from any nationality, be they MS-13 or Tren de Aragua and house them in his jails,” he said – referring to two notorious transnational gangs. In addition, Bukele “has offered to house in his jails dangerous American criminals in custody in our country, including those of US citizenship and legal residents,” Rubio said. Bukele confirmed the agreement on X, saying in a post, “We are willing to take in only convicted criminals (including convicted U.S. citizens) into our mega-prison (CECOT) in exchange for a fee.”