Salvadoran authorities have confirmed that U.S. President Donald Trump’s government maintains full jurisdiction over Venezuelan men who were deported to El Salvador in March.
Court documents submitted on Monday by the Venezuelan men’s lawyers contained responses by Salvadoran authorities to questions posed by the U.N.
The Trump administration is paying the Salvadoran government, led by President Nayib Bukele, $6 million USD to house 238 Venezuelan and 23 Salvadoran migrants who have been deported from the U.S., accused of being gang members. These deportees are currently being held in El Salvador’s mega-prison, known as the Terrorism Confinement Center (CECOT).
“The actions of the state of El Salvador have been limited to the implementation of a bilateral cooperation mechanism with another state, through which it has facilitated the use of the Salvadoran prison infrastructure for the custody of persons detained within the scope of the justice system and law enforcement of that other state,” noted Salvadoran authorities before the U.N.
They added: “In this context, jurisdiction and legal responsibility over these individuals rest exclusively with the competent foreign authorities.”
This appears to contradict assertions previously made by the White House, which claimed that the U.S. no longer had power over the deportees once they were out of the country.
In March, U.S. district judge James E. Boasberg issued an order to temporarily block the flights set to deport Venezuelan and Salvadoran migrants who had previously been living in the U.S.
The Trump administration did not follow this order, with White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt saying: “The order, which had no lawful basis, was issued after terrorist TdA [Tren de Aragua] aliens had already been removed from US territory,” adding: “The written order and the administration’s actions do not conflict.”
She continued: “A single judge in a single city cannot direct the movements of an aircraft carrying foreign alien terrorists who were physically expelled from U.S. soil.”
At the time, other Trump officials shared a similar sentiment, telling Axios that the Trump administration had not defied the court order, given that the planes were “already outside of U.S. airspace,” and therefore not subject to rulings issued by judges in the country. An official said that the order was therefore “not applicable.”
Salvadoran prisons, including CECOT, have been criticized by human rights groups, with Human Rights Watch (HRW) reporting that it is “not aware” of any detainees having been released from CECOT. The organization also reports “cases of torture, ill-treatment, incommunicado detention, severe violations of due process and inhumane conditions” in several Salvadoran prisons, including CECOT.
Following the presentation of the court documents, Lee Gelernt, a lawyer for the American Civil Liberties Union—which is representing the deported Venezuelan men alongside legal group Democracy Forward—told the New York Times: “We are pleased that El Salvador publicly told the truth about what we all knew: that it’s the United States that controls the fate of the Venezuelans.”
Skye Perryman, the president and chief executive of Democracy Forward, claimed: “The documents filed with the court today show that the administration has not been honest with the court or the American people.”
Featured image credit:
Image: CECOT prison
Author: La Prensa Gráfica via YouTube
Source: https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Aerial_view_of_CECOT.png
License: Article 45 of the Salvadoran copyright law
