In Order To Illegally Deport People To El Salvador, Trump Administration Stripped Informants Of Their Protections

Legal Issues

from the pure-evil-shit dept

You’re just a commodity in Trump’s marketplace of horrific ideas.

Sure, criminal informants are seldom the trustworthiest of people, what with their stay-out-of-jail free cards being reliant on their steady production of evidence against other people. But the government does make promises to criminal informants that it’s expected to keep, not only to fulfill its legal obligations but to prevent informants from being, you know, beaten, tortured, and killed by those they associate with and rat on.

But when it’s time to eject as many people with brown skin as possible, all bets are off. If you’re a government informant, maybe it’s time to renege on your own obligations before the government gets you killed. When the Trump government sought to deport hundreds of [checks notes] Venezuelans to El Salvador’s torture prison, “world’s coolest dictator” Nayib Bukele had a favor to ask of his own: the return of nine MS-13 gang members.

Here’s the latest bit of callous evil perpetrated by some of the most banally malignant people to ever hold office, as reported by the Washington Post:

Secretary of State Marco Rubio, in a March 13phone call with Salvadoran President Nayib Bukele, promised the request would be fulfilled, according to officials familiar with the conversation. But there was one obstacle: Some of the MS-13 members Bukele wanted were “informants” under the protection of the U.S. government, Rubio told him.

To deport them to El Salvador, Attorney General Pam Bondi would need to terminate the Justice Department’s arrangements with those men, Rubio said. He assured Bukele that Bondi would complete that process and Washington would hand over the MS-13 leaders.

Quite the quid pro quo, stripping people of the protection and safety they’d been guaranteed for the sole purpose of getting the green light for mass deportations of Venezuelan migrants. Well, the sole purpose on the Trump side of the equation. On the other side, there was a benefit beyond a little more burnishing of Bukele’s “tough on crime” reputation.

It was also a key step in hindering an ongoing U.S. investigation into his government’s relationship with MS-13, a gang famous for displays of excessive violence in the United States and elsewhere.

Basically, the State Department and the Trump administration offered up these gang members as literal human sacrifices in order to pursue its mass deportation program. Nothing greases the wheels like blood, I guess, and this administration’s collective hands have been covered with the substance since Trump’s inauguration.

And, as is always the case when authoritarians engage in human trafficking to further their bigoted ideals, the government spokespeople are there to remind everyone that the ends justify the means:

“The Trump Administration’s results speak for themselves,” said Tommy Pigott, a State Department spokesman. “Hardened TdA gang members are back in Venezuela … MS-13 gang members are being prosecuted in the U.S. and El Salvador. And Americans are safer as a result of these incredible efforts.”

Neat. I supposed just summarily executing anyone suspected of drug trafficking would probably put a dent in drug trafficking but that’s the sort of thing we just don’t…. hang on a second. I’m sorry. I’m now being told this is exactly the sort of thing we do, for the first time in our government’s history. My mistake.

At least 32 people have been killed in U.S. strikes on alleged drug boats. The Trump administration has said the U.S. is in a “non-international armed conflict” with drug cartels, arguing that the narcotics they smuggle kill tens of thousands of Americans every year, constituting an “armed attack.”

“When they’re loaded up with drugs, they’re fair game, and every one of those ships were,” President Trump told reporters last week.

Yep. And we’ll never know whether or not these claims have any basis in fact because all of the evidence has been drone-striked to the bottom of the ocean. Instead, we’re just expected to accept the new normal that moves extrajudicial drone strikes from areas of international conflict and into any body of water that might contain boats with Latin/South American citizens in them.

Of course, shitting on informants probably doesn’t even raise red flags in the DEA, ATF, CIA, FBI, or any other agency that used to be primarily concerned with actual criminal cases. Most of those resources are now being spent on pursuing people only suspected of civil violations of immigration law. If you’re from anywhere south of our border, you’re nothing more than meat puppets for a tyrant and his enablers.

Filed Under: cecot, due process, el salvador, marco rubio, mass deporation, state department, trump administration