At a White House meeting, presidents Nayib Bukele and Donald Trump exchanged praises and joked about mass incarceration as they discussed an unprecedented agreement: the USA would pay El Salvador US$6 million a year to house deportees – of any nationality, potentially including US citizens – in its Centre for Terrorism Confinement (CECOT), a notorious mega-prison. This agreement marked the evolution of Bukele’s authoritarian model from a domestic experiment to an exportable commodity appealing to strongmen worldwide.

Shortly after Trump’s inauguration, Bukele had tweeted an offer to help the US outsource its incarceration system. Less than six weeks later, hundreds of Venezuelan deportees were sent to CECOT under the 1798Alien Enemies Act. The Trump administration described them as members of the Tren de Aragua gang. However, the arrangement was fraught with legal complications: use of the Alien Enemies Act requires a declaration that the USA is at war, and it also quickly became clear that most deportees had no proven links to gangs.

Among them was Kilmar Abrego García, a Salvadoran man who’d lived in Maryland for 15 years and was deported despite being granted protections by a US immigration judge. He’s finally been returned to the USA, where he’s been slapped with people-trafficking charges. But when the US Supreme Court ordered the Trump administration to facilitate his return, Bukele refused on the grounds that he wouldn’t ‘smuggle a terrorist into the United States’. For Trump, this was one of the perks of having an ally who disregards the rule of law as much as he does.

Bukele’s path to authoritarianism

Bukele’s systematic assault on democracy began after his 2019 election win. Breaking from El Salvador’s traditional two-party system dominated by the left-wing Farabundo Martí National Liberation Front (FMLN) and the right-wing Nationalist Republican Alliance, Bukele ran with a small conservative party after being expelled from the FMLN, and secured 53.4 per cent of the vote.

The first significant sign of his willingness to ignore democratic norms came when, frustrated with the opposition-controlled Legislative Assembly’s refusal to approve a multi-million-dollar loan for his security and anti-gang programme, Bukele called on supporters, police and the army to pressure legislators. After the 2021 legislative election, however, he no longer faced such obstacles, as his party won a supermajority. This enabled him to pass any laws he desired and dismiss the judges who’d antagonised him by declaring some of his policies unconstitutional. The compliant new judges he appointed subsequently gave him the green light to run for an unconstitutional second term.

The cornerstone of Bukele’s authoritarian project was his March 2022 declaration of a state of emergency following a spike in gang killings. Initially presented as a temporary measure to address gang violence, the state of emergency has been repeatedly renewed and expanded. It’s become a new normal in which security forces have extraordinary powers while people no longer enjoy constitutional rights including due process, legal defence and freedom of assembly.

Bukele has implemented a security policy that involves massive deployment of police and military forces to surround and ‘extract’ suspected gang members from communities across the country and jail them in the newly built CECOT, with a stated capacity of 40,000 inmates. They’re held in extremely overcrowded conditions with no visits, education or rehabilitation programmes and, according to officials, will never be released.

This policy has led to the warrantless detention of over 80,000 people, giving El Salvador the world’s highest incarceration rate. Visible gang activity has dramatically fallen as a result, and El Salvador’s homicide rate plummeted from a staggering 105 per 100,000 people in 2015 to 1.9 per 100,000 people in 2024. This earned Bukele approval ratings above 90 per cent and re-election in February 2024 with 85 per cent of the vote.

Since his unconstitutional re-election, Bukele has accelerated the dismantling of El Salvador’s democratic institutions. The most significant development came on 29 January, when the Legislative Assembly ratified an amendment to make it easier to amend the constitution, eliminating the previous requirement that constitutional amendments be ratified by two successive legislatures. This means Bukele can now change the constitution without adequate consultation and debate. Safeguards protecting key constitutional norms, including those prohibiting presidential re-election, have been removed.

Constitutional manipulation has been accompanied by judicial capture. In September 2024, the Legislative Assembly elected seven new Supreme Court judges, despite civil society criticism of the absence of procedural transparency and concerns about the candidates’ lack of independence.

Civic space under assault

The deterioration of civic space has accelerated dramatically during Bukele’s second term. Due to mounting evidence that the prolonged state of emergency is undermining the rule of law and stifling peaceful dissent, El Salvador was added to the CIVICUS Monitor Watchlist – which tracks countries experiencing a serious decline in respect for civic space – in July 2024.

The state has intensified its criminalisation of civil society activists. In March 2024, Verónica Delgado was arbitrarily detained and charged with ‘unlawful association’ for her work as a member of the Search Block group, which searches for relatives who’ve disappeared under the state of emergency. In February 2025, at least 21 activists and civil society leaders were arbitrarily detained in coordinated operations. Among them was Fidel Zavala, spokesperson for the human rights organisation Unit for the Defence of Human and Community Rights, who’d recently filed a complaint against prison authorities citing cases of torture.

Environmental defenders are particularly targeted. In February 2025, the Attorney General’s Office requested the recapture of the five community leaders known as ‘the Santa Marta five’, who were acquitted last October after being systematically criminalised for their role in resisting mining projects and advocating for water rights. Their struggle was instrumental in securing El Salvador’s 2017 ban on mining for metals.

Bukele’s assault on press freedom has reached unprecedented levels. The Association of Journalists of El Salvador recorded 466 cases of attacks against journalists in 2024, a significant rise from 311 in 2023 and 187 in 2022, with most incidents linked to public officials and state institutions. Bukele has directly targeted independent media, using his Twitter/X account to discredit El Faro, a digital news outlet that investigated COVID-19 procurement contracts and has moved its operations to Costa Rica. Physical intimidation has escalated, with five National Civil Police officers raiding journalist Mónica Rodríguez’s home in December 2024, seizing hard drives and USB devices without a search warrant or any legal explanation.

State surveillance has become systematic and brazen. Leaked documents in November 2024 revealed that the Subdirectorate of Intelligence of El Salvador’s National Civil Police conducted unlawful surveillance targeting civil society members between late 2021 and early 2022, collecting personal data including photographs, home and office addresses and academic backgrounds. In September 2024, the government blocked the Telegram messaging app during media reports on the death in custody of a former National Security Advisor. In November 2024, the Legislative Assembly adopted two laws on cybersecurity and data protection that grant authorities broad powers to remove online content and demand deletion of material deemed ‘inaccurate’, paving the way for systematic censorship.

Russia-style Foreign Agents Law

Bukele’s assault on civil society took a further dangerous turn in May, when the Legislative Assembly passed a Russian-inspired Foreign Agents Law with little debate and no public consultation, despite having dropped a similar proposal following international backlash in 2021.

The law requires anyone – individual or organisation, local or foreign – who receives foreign funding to operate in El Salvador or acts in the interest of a foreign entity to register. Every payment they receive, whether in cash, goods or services, will be subject to a 30 per cent tax, with the law failing to specify how the tax revenue will be used.

The law creates a new body, the Registry of Foreign Agents (RAEX), with extensive powers to set registration requirements, approve or deny applications, revoke or refuse to renew registrations and demand documents or information at any time. While it will be possible to apply for exceptions, RAEX will have the final say on who can operate in El Salvador, essentially giving the government veto power over civil society organisations. Civil society expects that exemptions will only be granted to groups that align with the government, while those that expose corruption or abuse will be punished.

Unregistered organisations won’t be allowed to operate, and registered ones won’t be allowed to engage in activities deemed to be political or viewed as threatening public order or national security. They won’t be able to use foreign donations for undeclared activities or share information on behalf of foreign donors without labelling it as such. Violations can lead to fines of up to US$250,000 and possible closure.

The law’s impact will be particularly severe because Salvadoran civil society is heavily dependent on foreign donations due to a lack of domestic funding. Many organisations have been critical of Bukele’s actions against human rights and constitutional checks and balances, making their work vulnerable to being labelled political.

Authoritarianism for export

Bukele’s model has attracted admirers across the political spectrum worldwide. His re-election was hailed by many who seek to emulate him, and he receives sky-high approval ratings in other countries in the region, particularly those experiencing rising crime.

The Trump-Bukele deportation agreement is the most visible manifestation of authoritarian collaboration, but the partnership extends beyond immigration policy. Trump has expressed admiration for Bukele’s methods, recently announcing plans to rebuild and reopen Alcatraz Island, arguing the notorious prison would help circumvent judges that fail to do his bidding. Bukele has encouraged Trump’s defiance of judges, calling legal challenges to Trump’s policies ‘a judicial coup’ and urging Republicans to remove what he calls ‘corrupt judges’. Trump must also find Bukele’s systematic dismantling of civil society inspiring, viewing his criminalisation of activists and silencing of independent media as effective tools for consolidating power.

The international community’s response has been notably muted, reflecting the dilemma posed by Bukele’s genuine popularity and security achievements. The enthusiasm with which international observers have embraced what they see as Bukele’s success story demonstrates the dangerous appeal of authoritarian responses to complex social problems. His ability to achieve genuine, if not necessarily long-lasting, security improvements while systematically dismantling democratic institutions offers a seductive blueprint for other leaders frustrated by the constraints of democratic governance.

Bukele’s transformation of El Salvador from a fragile democracy into an authoritarian state is one of the most dramatic examples of democratic backsliding in contemporary Latin America, serving as a warning about the fragility of democratic institutions and an indication of how authoritarianism can adapt and spread. When Salvadorans eventually seek alternatives to Bukele’s increasingly repressive rule, they’ll face the struggle of having to repair the democratic machinery necessary for peaceful political change.

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