The Trump administration condemned “informants” under the protection of the United States government to be sent to El Salvador’s notoriously dangerous prison in a backroom deal back in March, insiders revealed for the first time Sunday, The Washington Post reported.
Earlier this year, the White House agreed to hand over nine MS-13 gang members in Justice Department custody to Salvadorian President Nayib Bukele in exchange for allowing the Trump administration to deport migrants to the South American nation.
While federal judges immediately demanded answers as to the details of the arrangement, what wasn’t known at the time was that among those gang members were individuals aiding the United States in its investigations into MS-13 leadership, now subject to the torturous conditions at El Salvador’s CECOT prison.
“The deal is a deep betrayal of U.S. law enforcement, whose agents risked their lives to apprehend the gang members,” said Douglas Farah, who aided federal officials in its investigations into MS-13, speaking with the Post. “Who would ever trust the word of U.S. law enforcement or prosecutors again?”
The new revelation was revealed by dozens of U.S. and El Salvador officials and lawyers for MS-13 gang members who spoke with the Post, most on the condition of anonymity.
The decision to hand over U.S. informants and condemn them to a possible life of torture at CECOT, the Post reported, was facilitated by Secretary of State Marco Rubio, who made the agreement with Bukele on a March 13 phone call, and later asked Attorney General Pam Bondi to terminate the U.S. government’s relationship with the informants to finalize the deal.
The long-term effects of the White House’s close relationship with Bukele – a strong ally to President Donald Trump – also dealt a major blow to morale in the U.S. State Department and its willingness to target MS-13, one former State Department official said.
“No one is wanting to investigate anything related to El Salvador or Bukele, because the Bukele administration right now has a direct line to the White House,” said a former State Department Official, speaking with the Post on the condition of anonymity. “No one is touching that.”
Inmates at CECOT have described its brutal conditions; accounts of beatings, sexual assault, and denial of life-saving medical care were rampant among those who spoke with the Post.