Men the Trump administration sent to El Salvador mega-prison freed in prisoner swap

[chowder66]

Source: NBC News

snip....

More than 200 Venezuelan immigrants whom the Trump administration had sent to a notorious mega-prison in El Salvador have been flown to Venezuela, El Salvador President Nayib Bukele said in a post on X.

The move was part of a prisoner swap in which the Venezuelan government released "a considerable number of Venezuelan political prisoners ... as well as all the American citizens it was holding as hostages," Bukele said, in exchange for the Venezuelan nationals who had been imprisoned in El Salvador.

In a post of his own, U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio said, "Thanks to @POTUS’s leadership, ten Americans who were detained in Venezuela are on their way to freedom."

Rubio also praised Bukele for "helping secure an agreement for the release of all of our American detainees, plus the release of Venezuelan political prisoners."

Read more: https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/national-security/men-trump-administration-sent-el-salvadors-cecot-prison-exchanged-pris-rcna219643

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more at link

Fuck Marco Rubio and this tyrannical administration.

[Norrrm]

2. How could Trump send them if El Salvador has total, legal control over them?

Is it possible that Trump lied?

OK!

[Deminpenn]

3. Once Buekle saw the fury this provoked in the US, he probably couldn't

wash his hands fast enough of whatever kind of initial agreement he had with Trump.

I'll bet other countries that are not the home countries of the deportees see what El Salvador just did and will reconsider taking anyone who isn't a citizen of their country.

[tulipsandroses]

4. This is shameful. They are going to tout this as a good thing since they were able to get Americans released from

Venezuela.
Mr.Art of the Deal wasn't able to get Americans back without kidnapping people and sending them to a a Gulag?

[Deminpenn]

6. It is shameful, but I think the exchange came about because

Buekle no longer wanted to deal with having the Venezuelan deportees. Buekle/El Salvador looked like the bad guys here.
I recall reading a few weeks ago that El Salvador said the deportees were under American control, not El Salvador's. That was after Trump said there was nothing the US could do to get them released because the deportees were under El Salvador control.

I think he told Trump/Rubio to figure out a way to get them out of El Salvador. I'm sure El Salvador negotiated and facilitated the swap. Like a 3 way deal in baseball, El Salvador traded Venezuela its nationals in exhange for Venezuela trading US nationals back to us.

[pat_k]

5. I am still trying to wrap my head around this.

Initial reporting was very, very confusing. Now reporting seems clear that ALL the migrants kidnapped in the U.S. and sent to El Salvador to be held in torturous conditions in CECOT (estimate of 250 is being reported, precise number not specified) have now been sent to Venezuela in exchange for 10 American "political prisoners" who were being held in VE.

We have NO information about how many of the migrants who have now been sent from El Salvador to Venezuela came to the U.S. to seek asylum because return to Venezuela would be a sentence of death.

Their disposition and probable treatment in Venezuela seems unclear. There are reports that Interior Minister Diosdado Cabello told reporters the men would undergo medical tests and background checks before they can go home.

So are they all going home?

Or will some face the risks of political or gang persecution they came here to escape?

And WTF, don't we have cases in process seeking to get various of the kidnapped back here to be given their due process rights?

Doesn't help anything, but as I read more about this (and hit walls of incredibly limited information) I found myself screaming in my car earlier. And the reporting all seems so damn matter-of-fact about all this. Nothing about the context, pending cases here, guarantees (or lack thereof) of safety or support services from Venezuela, recognition that the horrific actions by the 47 regime that put these men in a concentration camp had absolutely nothing with deporting so-called "criminals"... f-ing nothing.