Just over a week ago, 238 Venezuelan migrants were deported by the U.S. government to a maximum-security prison in El Salvador—CECOT, a facility notorious for its horrifying conditions. Many of these people had come to the United States as asylum seekers, fleeing gang violence and instability back home. Some of them may indeed have ties to criminal groups like Tren de Aragua. 

But many others were ordinary people: a barber from Texas, a makeup artist, a former professional footballer—people with no criminal records, no violent pasts. They were trying to build a new life. Some had even signed voluntary departure agreements, expecting to return to Venezuela. Instead, they were shipped—without warning—to a prison that has become infamous for its brutality. 

El Salvador’s CECOT was built by President Nayib Bukele as part of his aggressive anti-gang strategy. And while the country’s homicide rate has dramatically dropped (from one of the highest in the world to among the lowest in the region) the crackdown has come at a steep cost. El Salvador now has the highest incarceration rate globally, with nearly 2% of its population behind bars. That’s almost triple the U.S. percentage, which is itself considerable. 

Inside CECOT, detainees live in conditions that human rights groups call inhumane. Up to 100 people are packed into each cell, sharing just two toilets and two sinks. They sleep on bare metal bunks with no mattresses. There is no outdoor time, no family visits. Inmates are locked away for 24 hours a day in a concrete fortress with no sunlight and no dignity. Truly hell on earth, a place where no innocent person should ever be sent. 

That is the heart of the issue. America is a nation founded on law and order. On the principle that guilt must be proven — not assumed. If someone is suspected of gang affiliation, they deserve a day in court. Evidence. Representation. The chance to speak. That’s what separates democracies from authoritarian regimes.

Even Venezuela’s President Nicolás Maduro—no stranger to authoritarianism himself—called the act a “kidnapping,” and urged El Salvador not to be complicit. It’s hard to argue with that language. When people are deported based on unproven accusations, and then hidden away in a foreign prison with no recourse or access to counsel, it doesn’t just violate their rights. It undermines the very foundation of American justice.

This isn’t justice — it’s a horror show dressed up as immigration policy. It’s Trump trying to prove his toughness to an anti-immigrant base that demands blood. And because he can’t go after the undocumented workers propping up his billionaire buddies’ farms and hotels, he’s going after asylum seekers instead. People who trusted in America. People now lost in a black hole halfway across the continent.

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