After 62 killings in a single day in March 2022, El Salvador's Legislative Assembly approved a state of exception that suspended some constitutional rights and has been extended every month since. The government reports more than 92,000 arrests and record low homicide figures, while rights groups report hundreds of deaths in custody. The crackdown drew US attention in 2025 when the Trump administration sent deportees to the CECOT mega prison.
The state of exception remains in force after the assembly approved a 56th extension on 21 October 2026, running from 28 October to 26 November 2026, El Diario de Hoy reported. Bukele's term ends on 1 June 2027 under the 2025 constitutional reform, which allows him to seek re-election, and he is his party's candidate in the general election set for 28 February 2027, according to EFE.
40 events shown
Nayib Bukele, running for the Grand Alliance for National Unity (GANA), won El Salvador's presidential election with nearly 54 percent of the vote with about 90 percent of ballots counted, according to the Supreme Electoral Court as reported by NBC News.
NBC NewsArmed soldiers and police entered the Legislative Assembly on Bukele's orders after opposition lawmakers did not approve a 109 million dollar loan for security equipment, NPR reported. The opposition called it intimidation, and Human Rights Watch called it an exhibition of brute force.
At its first session, the new Legislative Assembly led by Bukele's Nuevas Ideas party voted 64 of 84 to remove the five Constitutional Chamber magistrates and Attorney General Raul Melara and named replacements, El Faro reported. The ousted chamber declared the removal unconstitutional that night, and the US Secretary of State voiced serious concerns.
The Constitutional Chamber named in May ordered the electoral tribunal to permit a second consecutive presidential term, opening the way for Bukele to run in 2024, the Associated Press reported. Previous courts had read the constitution as barring re-election for 10 years.
Police reported 62 homicides on Saturday 26 March 2022 after 14 killings the day before, the Associated Press reported. Al Jazeera said it was the most violent day in nearly three decades. The country had recorded 1,140 murders in 2021, according to Al Jazeera.
In an early Sunday session the assembly approved a state of exception for up to 30 days at Bukele's request, the Associated Press reported. It restricted freedom of assembly and loosened arrest rules, including the right to be told the reason for arrest, access to a lawyer and the 72 hour limit on administrative detention, according to Al Jazeera.
Human Rights Watch and Cristosal reported more than 58,000 arrests, including more than 1,600 children, and 90 deaths in custody since late March 2022. They said hearings were held in groups of up to 500 detainees and that some detentions amounted to enforced disappearance.
Bukele announced that about 2,000 prisoners, most suspected gang members, had been moved at dawn into the new Terrorism Confinement Center (CECOT), Voice of America and Al Jazeera reported. Both outlets described it as a prison with space for 40,000 people.
A year into the state of exception, the UN human rights office said at least 65,000 people had been detained and about 90 had allegedly died in custody. It urged an end to arrests without adequate legal basis and transparent investigation of deaths in detention.
An attributed statement records what the speaker said.
The news outlet El Faro announced that it had moved its administrative and legal operations to a nonprofit registered in San Jose, Costa Rica, while keeping its main newsroom in El Salvador, Voice of America reported. El Faro cited tax audits, criminal accusations it called fabricated, and Pegasus spyware attacks on its staff.
Cristosal reported that at least 153 people jailed since March 2022 had died in state custody, nearly half violently, the Associated Press and NBC News reported. NBC said the government reported more than 68,000 arrests and more than 5,000 releases and had not given an official count of deaths in custody.
Bukele won the 4 February 2024 election with 84.65 percent of the vote according to the Supreme Electoral Tribunal's final count, confirmed two weeks later, AFP reported. Turnout was 52.6 percent. Organization of American States observers said they were concerned about delays in the legislative count.
The prosecutor's office reported 114 homicides in 2024, and Bukele cited a rate of 1.9 per 100,000, the Associated Press reported. The 2023 figure was 214, including 38 deaths of alleged gang members. Authorities said more than 83,000 people accused of gang links had been captured, Bukele said 8,000 innocent detainees had been released, and rights groups counted 354 deaths in custody.
After meeting Bukele, US Secretary of State Marco Rubio said El Salvador would hold deportees of any nationality with criminal records and had offered to house US citizens serving prison terms, the Miami Herald reported. Bukele said the fee would be low for the US but significant for El Salvador.
Kilmar Abrego Garcia, a Salvadoran man living in Maryland who had been detained by ICE on 12 March, was deported to El Salvador and held in prison there, the Associated Press reported. A 2019 immigration court order had barred his removal to El Salvador.
Over the weekend of 15 and 16 March 2025 the US sent about 250 people it said were Tren de Aragua members to El Salvador after Trump invoked the Alien Enemies Act, NPR reported. Bukele said 238 Tren de Aragua members and 23 MS-13 members had arrived and would be held in CECOT for one year, after Judge James Boasberg had ordered the deportations blocked. The Associated Press, citing a memo it obtained, reported the US would pay 6 million dollars for about 300 prisoners.
NPR, via KAXEAssociated Press, via The Dallas Morning NewsIn Trump v. J.G.G., the Supreme Court vacated the district court's March orders, holding that detainees must challenge Alien Enemies Act removals through habeas petitions in the district where they are held. It said detainees must receive notice in time to seek that relief before removal. Four justices dissented in whole or part.
The Supreme Court left in place a district court order requiring the government to facilitate Abrego Garcia's release from custody in El Salvador, noting the government had acknowledged his removal was an administrative error and therefore illegal. It asked the lower court to clarify the word effectuate.
Meeting President Donald Trump in the Oval Office, Bukele said he did not have the power to return Abrego Garcia to the United States, McClatchy reported. Trump said he had the best relationship with Bukele.
An attributed statement records what the speaker said.
Police arrested Ruth Lopez, head of Cristosal's anti-corruption and justice program, at her home, NPR reported, and the attorney general's office accused her of embezzling state funds in connection with past work for a former electoral tribunal magistrate. Cristosal and her family denied the charge and called it politically motivated. Prosecutors later changed the charge to illicit enrichment, and she was still in pretrial detention without trial in September 2026, according to Human Rights Watch and El Diario de Hoy.
The Legislative Assembly approved a law requiring people and groups funded from abroad to register as foreign agents and pay a 30 percent tax on foreign income, with fines of 1,000 to 150,000 dollars, CPJ reported. The government said the law promotes transparency and protects sovereignty. CPJ called for its repeal.
Abrego Garcia was returned to the United States and charged with human smuggling based on a 2022 traffic stop in Tennessee, the Associated Press reported. He pleaded not guilty.
Cristosal said it had suspended operations in El Salvador and moved about 20 staff out of the country, Reuters and the Los Angeles Times reported. The Association of Journalists of El Salvador said at least 40 journalists had left since May. El Faro pulled its reporters out after warnings of arrest, the Los Angeles Times reported.
An attributed statement records what the speaker said.
El Salvador sent 252 Venezuelans held in CECOT to Venezuela in exchange for 10 Americans and people described as political prisoners released by Venezuela, CBS News reported. Rubio said every wrongfully detained American in Venezuela was now free.
Lawmakers voted 57 to 3 to amend the constitution to allow indefinite presidential re-election, extend terms to six years, end runoffs and move the end of Bukele's term from 2029 to 1 June 2027, the Associated Press reported.
Abrego Garcia left jail in Tennessee on 22 August and ICE notified him it intended to deport him to Uganda. He was taken into ICE custody when he reported to a Baltimore office on 25 August, the Associated Press reported.
The Association of Journalists of El Salvador announced it was moving its legal registration to another country in response to the foreign agents law, the Associated Press and Diario El Mundo reported. It said 43 journalists left El Salvador between March and June 2025. Bukele has described critical NGOs as sympathetic to the gangs, according to AP.
Human Rights Watch and Cristosal said they interviewed 40 of the Venezuelans held at CECOT and alleged torture and enforced disappearance. They said about half had no criminal history and that the US reportedly paid El Salvador at least 4.7 million dollars. Neither government responded to their requests.
A federal judge in Maryland ordered ICE to release Abrego Garcia immediately, the Associated Press reported.
A federal judge in Maryland ruled that ICE could not re-detain Abrego Garcia, the Associated Press reported.
InSight Crime reported 82 homicides in El Salvador in 2025, a rate of 1.3 per 100,000 and a 32.2 percent fall from 2024. It said the official method has since 2019 omitted killings by police of alleged gang members, killings in prisons and bodies in unmarked graves, a change it first reported in July 2019, and that a lack of transparency made the data hard to verify.
Socorro Juridico Humanitario said at least 500 people had died in state custody since March 2022, according to the Tico Times. Officials have described most deaths as natural causes linked to prior illness, and the government said more than 91,300 people had been detained and about 8,000 freed.
Cristosal's Noah Bullock told the Tom Lantos Human Rights Commission that the group had documented 513 deaths in custody, including 181 it linked to physical violence. He said Cristosal lawyer Ruth Lopez had been held for nearly a year without trial.
An attributed statement records what the speaker said.
The US deported 5,033 Salvadorans to El Salvador from January to March 2026, up from 2,547 a year earlier, according to Salvadoran migration figures the Associated Press obtained on 12 May. AP said Bukele had joined a Trump backed regional coalition called the Shield of the Americas.
An attributed statement records what the speaker said.
US District Judge Waverly Crenshaw in Nashville dismissed the human smuggling charges against Abrego Garcia for vindictive or selective prosecution, the Associated Press reported. Administration officials have said he cannot stay in the US and have proposed deporting him to a third country.
The assembly voted 57 to 1 for a 51st 30 day extension, in force from 31 May to 29 June 2026, keeping suspended the right to defence, the limit on administrative detention and privacy of communications, El Diario de Hoy and the Tico Times reported. Both cited official figures of more than 92,300 arrests, and the Tico Times said the government had acknowledged at least 8,000 detainees as innocent.
Federal prosecutors filed notice that they would appeal the dismissal of the smuggling case to the US Court of Appeals for the 6th Circuit, ABC News and the Tennessee Lookout reported. Abrego Garcia also faces a separate court fight in Maryland over the government's efforts to deport him to a third country, the Tennessee Lookout reported.
Amnesty International said more than 90,000 people had been detained and at least 470 had died in custody, and that mass arbitrary detention, torture and enforced disappearance could amount to crimes against humanity. The government presents the measure as a successful security policy, Amnesty noted.
Trump received Bukele in the Oval Office in a closed meeting, AFP and La Prensa Grafica reported, days after Bukele was proclaimed his party's presidential candidate for the February 2027 election, according to EFE. La Prensa Grafica said local media citing official information reported that security and migration were discussed.
The assembly approved a 54th extension running from 29 August to 27 September 2026, with 57 votes in favour, Diario El Mundo reported. The Ministry of Security reported 92,959 captures. Socorro Juridico Humanitario counted 564 deaths of detainees, and a governing party lawmaker cited 35 homicides so far in 2026.
Across two Trump terms the United States moved from sanctions on Nicolás Maduro and his government to recognising a rival interim president, indicting Maduro and, in...
From January 2025 the Department of Homeland Security moved to end Temporary Protected Status for Venezuela, Haiti, Syria, Honduras, Nicaragua, Nepal, Afghanistan...
In 2024 Adani Group companies pursued a 30-year privately initiated proposal to expand and run Jomo Kenyatta International Airport and signed a 30-year, Sh95.68...
Charlie Kirk, co-founder of Turning Point USA, was shot and killed while speaking at Utah Valley University on 10 September 2025. Tyler James Robinson, 22...
NBC News · nbcnews.com
NPR · npr.org
Associated Press, via PBS NewsHour · pbs.org
Al Jazeera · aljazeera.com
Human Rights Watch · hrw.org NBC News · nbcnews.com NPR, via KAXE · kaxe.org
CBS News · cbsnews.com Human Rights Watch · hrw.org
Associated Press, via ABC 17 News · abc17news.com Al Jazeera · aljazeera.com Human Rights Watch · hrw.orgCoverage through 26 August 2026. Editorial review: 1 November 2026. Spotted an error? See corrections. Copyright concerns: report an asset. Every event links to its sources. Source type does not establish whether a claim is true.