Bukele Gets Trump to Toss the Work of Vulcan, the Task Force that Pursued MS-13
Tuesday, June 24th, 2025
Carlos García
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The Donald Trump administration intends to secretly drop charges against leaders of the Mara Salvatrucha-13 (MS-13) accused of acts of terrorism, whom the U.S. president ordered to be prosecuted during his first term, and whose capture was the priority objective of the Joint Task Force Vulcan.
Vulcan was created and announced with great fanfare by Trump in 2019 as a unit specially designed to combat MS-13, bringing together the Department of Homeland Security, several federal agencies, and ten prosecutors’ offices which had operated in five countries. One of the most publicized results of this unit was the capture of nine leaders of that gang, all Salvadorans accused of narco-terrorism, human trafficking, murders committed in the United States, and planning the assassination of an FBI agent, among other alleged crimes.
The U.S. government, through the Interim U.S. Attorney for the Eastern District of New York, John J. Durham, has already asked the Eastern District Court of New York to drop the charges against two of the nine MS-13 leaders: Antonio López Larios, alias “Greñas”, and Vladimir Antonio Arévalo Chávez, known as “Vampiro”. In both cases, Durham argued before the court that there were more important “geopolitical” and “national security” considerations than holding these gang members accountable for the crimes of which they were accused.
Durham invoked Rule 48 of the Federal Rules of Criminal Procedure, which states that “the government may, with leave of court, dismiss an indictment, information, or complaint” provided that it is not contrary to the public interest.
Greñas had the charges against him dropped in March 2025 and was immediately deported to El Salvador. In Vampiro’s case, his lawyers are fighting a fierce battle against the prosecution to prevent his deportation to El Salvador. Prosecutor Durham sought to have the charges against Vampiro dropped and his deportation carried out in secret, arguing that “public disclosure of this motion before the operation is complete could cause harm to the government’s relationship with a foreign ally,” referring to the Bukele government.
More:
https://beta.elfaro.net/en/el-salvador-en/bukele-gets-trump-to-toss-the-work-of-vulcan-the-task-force-that-pursued-ms-13