El Salvador Perspectives

El Salvador's Foreign Minister, Alexandra Hill, was in Washington, D.C. yesterday to sign an agreement with the US Department of Homeland Security.  In the agreement Hill signed, El Salvador pledges to work with the US to become a country where refugees from third countries can seek asylum.  Reuters reported on the joint press conference announcing the agreement: “The core of this is recognizing El Salvador’s development of their own asylum system and committing to help them build that capacity,” Acting Department of Homeland Security Secretary Kevin McAleenan told reporters in Washington after signing documents with El Salvador’s minister of foreign affairs, Alexandra Hill.  “Individuals crossing through El Salvador should be able to seek protections” in the Central American country even if they were intending to apply for asylum in the United States, he added.  Neither official said when the arrangement would take effect or provide details on how it woul...

Officials in El Salvador hope to make visas for farmworkers available for temporary stints  in the United States in the near future.  El Salvador's Minister of Labor Rolando Castro says he will travel soon to the US to discuss details of the program. There was immediate interest when the program was first announced, the AP reported: Hundreds of Salvadorans who had waited in line for U.S. work visas have started heading back to their hometowns after learning the program wasn’t ready yet.  The lines started forming in front of the Labor Ministry last week after the government announced it was negotiating a temporary farm work visa program with the United States.  Other countries like Mexico have long had access to such H-2A visas.  But by Monday, officials at El Salvador’s Labor Ministry acknowledged they could only take people’s names for a later date when the program is finally implemented. RevistaFactum shared profiles of some of those hoping t...

[Data nerd warning.   This post will be full of numbers and statistics regarding Salvadorans deported from Mexico and the US]. This first chart, using data from El Salvador's migration agency, shows the dramatic increase in Salvadoran migrants deported from Mexico earlier this year as Mexico increased troops and patrols in response to Tramp's demands. But it is also interesting to compare monthly average deportation rates from Mexico to El Salvador in earlier years, because the high rates from this summer are in the same range as seen in 2015-16: Monthly average deportees from Mexico to El Salvador: 2017 -- 924 2016 -- 2596 2015 -- 2411  2018 -- 925 Deportations from the United States to El Salvador, however, have occurred in a more consistent range. Deportations in 2019 have generally been 10-20% higher than the same period in 2018. But deportations from the US to El Salvador under Trump still lag behind deportations under Obama: Monthl...

Sunday, September 15, was Independence Day in El Salvador.   In cities and towns across the country, bands marched, school children recited the meaning of national symbols, flags waved, folk dancers in colorful dresses performed, and baton twirlers twirled. Here are some photos from the celebration in the town of Tonacatepeque. In the capital city of San Salvador, there was a grand military parade, presided over by Nayib Bukele.  This final photo of troops carrying out a mock "anti-terrorist" operation was the subject of many critics on social media who objected to a display of tactics frequently abused by the military, and at a time when many are protesting the growing militarization of public security in the country.  The scene also hearkened back to images of government repression during conflict years of the 70s and 80s.  Military displays on Independence Day are nothing new in El Salvador.  Troops with armored vehicles, ...

Here is a collection of English language articles regarding Nayib Bukele's first 100 days in office and the launch of the International Commission Against Impunity in El Salvador (CICIES): Global Americans:  El Salvador’s CICIES is a good start, but it’s going to need a lot of work Americas Quarterly:  Can El Salvador's New Anti-Corruption Commission Deliver? Revista Factum:  Bukele Announces his CICIES with no Legislative or Judicial Backing El Faro:  Government and OAS Announce Technical Round Table for a CICIES Subordinate to the Executive Branch Reuters:  United Nations to aid El Salvador anti-corruption body NACLA:   100 Days of Nayib Bukele in El Salvador: Social Movement Perspectives World Politics Review:  Is El Salvador’s New Social-Media Savvy President Promising Too Much?  (subscription required)

Although Donald Trump faces political challenges in building a physical wall across the southern US border, he is having more success in extending a southern frontier first to the southern border of Mexico and now into Central America.  BuzzFeed describes how this is happening: In recent months, the Trump administration has begun arm-twisting governments in Latin America into doing its own border work, much like the EU has done with Libya to deal with its immigrant crisis in the Mediterranean. Using a carrot-and-stick approach, the US has threatened the Mexican and Guatemalan governments with sanctions, while also offering Guatemala the promise of work visas for its citizens — and has at least partially succeeded in having them deter immigration through their territories....  These may be the tip of a growing iceberg, with deterrence policies likely to expand ever southward. Last week, acting US Secretary of the Department of Homeland Security Kevin McAleenan travele...

Salvadorans fleeing violence and persecution because of their political beliefs, their religion, their sexual orientation, their opposition to gangs, their gender, or any other reason will be precluded from seeking asylum in the US under a ruling Wednesday from the US Supreme Court .   At least while lower court litigation is still pending, the court ruled that the Trump administration may enforce a rule (known by its critics as "Asylum Ban 2.0") that denies asylum to anyone who crossed the southern US border after July 16, 2019 unless they first applied for and were denied asylum in Mexico (or another country like Guatemala).  This rule now applies to thousands of Salvadorans who crossed the border in just the past several weeks since July 16.  It will also apply to Salvadorans who are currently waiting in lines at US border crossing points to request asylum the "right way", under a US practice of "metering" the number of asylum seekers who can enter....