FILE PHOTO: Inmates sit inside a jail during a media tour at the Terrorism Confinement Center (CECOT) prison, in Tecoluca, El Salvador April 4, 2025. REUTERS/Jose Cabezas/File Photo
Former Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-FL), now a star at the far-right One America News Network, took the lead with a delegation of mostly Republican lawmakers to visit an infamous megaprison in El Salvador that President Donald Trump is using as part of a deal with that country's autocratic President Nayib Bukele to house large numbers of deportees the administration accuses of being gang members.
But the narrative he and some other outlets have pushed about what the cameras saw when they visited the wing for U.S. deportees at the Terrorism Confinement Center, or CECOT, is completely false, one immigration expert wrote.
"Throughout Gaetz’s report, which included the Trump loyalist walking through the halls of the maximum-security facility with several members of Congress, much of the footage focused on the difference in behavior between accused MS-13 members and those incarcerated in the TdA ward," reported The Independent. “What no other news organization has shown you until now is the specific ward at CECOT that holds the Venezuelan-based Tren de Aragua members President Trump deported. See if you can notice them reacting differently,” Gaetz told his viewers.
EXCLUSIVE: Breastfeeding mom of US citizen sues Kristi Noem after being grabbed by ICE
The footage then showed what The Independent claimed to be the deportees "loudly heckling, taunting and shouting at the OAN host and lawmakers" — but that's not actually what the footage showed, American Immigration Council attorney Aaron Reichlin-Melnick wrote on X.
"This was an outright lie," wrote Reichlin-Melnick. "There was no taunting, they were shouting 'freedom!' and 'kidnapped!' while making the international handsign for people who are victims of trafficking and abuse!"
Gaetz, who resigned from Congress shortly after the 2024 election, was Trump's initial pick to serve as attorney general. But this was derailed as the House Ethics Committee concluded its lengthy investigation into accusations that Gaetz engaged in child sex trafficking, illicit drug use, and campaign finance violations.