Trump and Bukele Meet at White House Over Migration
Marco Rubio, who was present at the meeting, thanked El Salvador for its cooperation and said the country had “become a model of security."
U.S. President Donald Trump welcomed his Salvadoran counterpart, Nayib Bukele, to the White House on Monday for a meeting focused on migration cooperation.
The meeting followed a recent agreement between the two countries, which included a $6 million contribution from Washington to help El Salvador operate its maximum-security prison, the Center for Confinement of Terrorism (CECOT).
The facility will receive alleged members of the Venezuelan criminal group Tren de Aragua and El Salvador’s own MS-13 gang, deported from the United States.
Seated in the Oval Office before their closed-door talks, Bukele told Trump that El Salvador was “eager to help.” “You have a gang problem, a terrorism problem. There are 350 million people to free, but to free them, you have to jail some,” he said.
Trump responded by thanking him for the cooperation, calling Bukele a “tremendous president.” He also said the meeting was part of an effort to solve the “open borders” issue he claims was inherited from previous administrations.
Since returning to the presidency in January, Trump has met with several Latin American leaders, but Bukele is the first to be hosted at the White House rather than at Trump’s private residence, Mar-a-Lago—an indication of the strong relationship between the two leaders.
Migration Takes Center Stage
Bukele has become a key ally in the U.S. mass deportation strategy. Since March, his country’s maximum-security prison has housed more than 200 migrants deported for alleged ties to the aforementioned gangs.
U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio, who was present at the meeting, thanked El Salvador for its cooperation and said the country had “become a model of security and prosperity in our hemisphere.”
Bukele emphasized that the collaboration was helping make the U.S. “the safest country,” while Trump praised having “someone to send the worst of the worst to.”
Trump also took the opportunity to criticize former President Joe Biden. “We had stupid people running this country. What they did at the border can never and will never be forgotten. It’s a disgrace—and you’re helping us fix it. We appreciate it,” he told the Salvadoran president.
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