Bukele refuses to return Abrego Garcia, reports
May 1, 2025
The U.S. Trump administration has been in touch directly Nayib Bukele, El Salvador’s president, in recent days about the detention of Kilmar Abrego García, the man wrongly deported to a notorious prison in El Salvador, reports the Guardian. The New York Times reports that the outreach was in the form of a note to enquire about whether García Abrego could be released.
Bukele, reportedly, rebuffed the outreach. The Bukele administration claimed the man should stay in El Salvador because he was a Salvadoran citizen, reports the New York Times.
But some experts say its unclear whether the outreach was genuine or window dressing to give the appearance of being in compliance with the recent Supreme Court ruling ordering the White House to “facilitate” Abrego García’s release.
Asked whether there had been contact between Trump and Bukele regarding the case, U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio said: "I'll never tell you that," Rubio said. "And you know who else? I'll never tell a judge, because the conduct of our foreign policy belongs to the president of the United States and the executive branch, not some judge." (ABC)
Earlier this week Trump said to a journalist that he "could" call up Bukele to secure Abrego García’s return. (CBS)
U.S. Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem said that if Abrego García was sent back to the U.S., Trump administration “would immediately deport him again.” (Guardian)
More Deportations
WOLA president Carolina Jiménez Sandoval makes an emotional appeal about the relevance of deportations to El Salvador: “U.S. Americans and others around the world must take note of the facts and their legal and political consequences: 238 Venezuelan migrants were detained by the U.S. government and transferred to a megaprison in a third country, their names removed from official databases, and their identities and whereabouts never officially disclosed or provided to their relatives or legal representatives by either of the two governments involved in the removal proceedings (i.e. concealment of the person’s fate or whereabouts). Under international human rights law, this may amount to a case of mass enforced disappearances, the very crime that countless citizens across Latin America have suffered and one that continues to haunt the region today.” (El Faro)
Case and point, in El Salvador, “where tens of thousands of men have been swept up in mass arrests in recent years, the disappearance of men into prisons not to be heard from again is disturbingly familiar,” reports the New York Times.
Mexico
Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum said families of disappeared people would be head in the case of a Jalisco ranch that activists say was an extermination camp, after the attorney general’s office rejected that hypothesis, reports Animal Político. (See yesterday’s briefs.)
Brazil
It’s unclear how far a plan to have Brazil’s national football team wear red jerseys as an alternate uniform will go — but the ensuing kerfuffle says a lot about how politics has infiltrated nationalism off the pitch. (Guardian)
Regional Relations
U.S. President Donald Trump’s “approach to foreign policy in his second term has been transactional, unpredictable and exploitative. Allies and enemies alike are beginning to adapt,” reports the New York Times.
Trump’s Latin America fan club - Javier Milei, Nayib Bukele and Daniel Noboa — are hoping to parlay warm relations with the U.S. president into loans and financing, reports the Financial Times.
The Guardian editorial board argues that Argentina’s new IMF deal “shows how America-first dealmaking is bending global finance to serve authoritarian and extractive ends.”
Russia expects to open its first embassy in the Dominican Republic as Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov defined the Caribbean country as a “promising partner,” yesterday, reports the Associated Press.
Haiti
Dozens of people swam and waded across Haiti’s Artibonite River yesterday in a desperate attempt to flee gangs that launched a fresh attack on Petite Rivière, a city in the country’s central region that has been under siege for almost a week, reports the Associated Press.
Haiti’s gangs “are about to win within months if not weeks. That is a dark analysis, but likely accurate, and analysts must not just warn that Haiti might collapse but begin thinking about what it means for Haiti to be under the full control of violent gangs instead of a recognized government,” writes James Bosworth in World Politics Review.
Chile
Chilean police forces in Santiago, aided by the FBI, took down an international gang of thieves that carried out robberies in the United States, reports Reuters.
Regional
"Corruption is a key component of the arms trafficking networks that funnel state-owned weapons into the hands of organized crime, according to a new report from Transparency International — InSight Crime.
Colombia
Rebel groups in Colombia are using apps like Facebook and Tik Tok to recruit children and young adults, and social media companies must do more to moderate content, the United Nations says — Associated Press.
Colombia’s emerald capital, Muzo, is weighing the long-term cost of its industry, as big companies and informal miners blame each other for the damage to rivers and forests, reports the Guardian.
Ecuador
Ecuador’s ministers of defense and interior toured El Salvador’s CECOT prison, looking for ideas to adapt at home. (MercoPress)
Stories
“The narrative of ancient tribes around the world regularly using ayahuasca and magic mushrooms in healing practices is a popular one. Is it true?” - Guardian Long Read
El Eternauta, the new adaptation of the iconic Argentine comic written Héctor Oesterheld and illustrated by Francisco Solano López, about struggles against repression — in the form of an alien invasion — is out on Netflix. Beyond the toxic snowfall storyline, it is about ordinary people with few resources and no special powers who collectively stare down a totalitarian threat, says lead actor, Ricardo Darín. (Buenos Aires Times)
Happy International Workers’ Day.