Bukele claims to have cleaned up El Salvador. But at what cost?

The last time I was in El Salvador, almost a decade ago, the capital was gripped by gang violence that terrorized people, dictating where they could shop, work, go to school or even cross a street.

The murders were constantly increasing, with little police investigation and no justice. Bodies were dumped on the sidewalks of the neighborhood and in clandestine graves. “We didn’t even exhume many of the bodies.” [mass] “There are mass graves,” Dr. Saúl Quijada, a forensic doctor who works in one of the city’s morgues, told me in April 2015.

When I returned this summer, San Salvador was transformed. It was safe to walk around at night and move around the city as normally as in an American capital. Officially, at least, only a handful of people were killed per day per capita, fewer than in Los Angeles or Washington.

But at what cost has this change come?

The new climate is credited to El Salvador’s autocratic president, Nayib Bukele, who was sworn in for a constitutionally questionable second term in office in June. The inauguration was attended by some of Bukele’s biggest admirers, including Donald Trump Jr. and former Fox TV host Tucker Carlson.

Bukele has built a well-funded public relations machine touting his administration’s ability to reduce El Salvador’s homicide rate to a fraction of its past figures.

By creating a carefully orchestrated public persona, he has also trampled on human rights and worked to dismantle democracy, critics say.

Outside analysts question the statistics Bukele frequently cites, but those doubts have not stopped politicians across the Americas from expressing admiration for Bukele, a 43-year-old publicist with almost no political experience.

Bukele and government officials declined to comment for this article. The president has dismissed accusations of corruption, abuses and rights violations as propaganda from his enemies.

He began to make inroads into electoral politics when he successfully ran for mayor of San Salvador in 2015, first allying himself with the leftist ideas of former guerrillas who fought in the country’s civil war, the Farabundo Martí National Liberation Front, and then abruptly turning right and joining the so-called conservative family values ​​movement, staunchly opposing LGBTQ rights, women’s equality, and abortion.

Bukele has said he wants to be the “coolest dictator in the world.”

A couple stands in front of a political mural depicting President Nayib Bukele with a message that reads: “I order you to sell 3 pupusas for one dollar,” part of a government offensive to lower food prices, in San Salvador, El Salvador.

(Salvador Melendez/AP)

Assuming crime has been reduced as much as the government claims, the question is how. For the past two and a half years, Bukele has been governing under a “state of exception,” essentially an emergency decree that suspends many constitutional and civil rights and allows for mass, arbitrary arrests without due process, among other harsh measures.

The raids have rounded up tens of thousands of people, more than 1% of the national population, and thrown them into overcrowded prisons.

Many are gang members, but many are not, according to human rights activists, and authorities have been slow to make the distinction. Several thousand of the prisoners are children, exposed to appalling conditions and torture, and several hundred have died, according to human rights organizations and the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights.

The Bukele government denies that torture is common and says most deaths have been from natural causes.

After winning the presidential election in 2019, Bukele pursued a strategy already used by dictators around the world: packing the judiciary with loyal supporters and using a legislative majority to rewrite the rules of government and consolidate his power. That led him to run for reelection this year, in violation of the Salvadoran constitution but with an exception drafted by his acolytes in Congress and the judiciary. He was virtually unopposed in the race.

It’s true that he won both presidential elections by wide margins and that Bukele often cites polls that give him an extraordinarily high approval rating. But experts say some of the opinion polls Bukele has used to demonstrate his popularity do not meet the rigorous standards of international surveys, while critics say Bukele has managed to silence much of the opposition.

Salvadoran soldiers take part in an independence day celebration led by President Nayib Bukele in Ciudad Arce, El Salvador, on September 15.

(Salvador Meléndez/Associated Press)

My experience in El Salvador was always that people were generally communicative, politically engaged and willing to share their ideas. On this trip, however, I found people, including sources I have known for decades, more cautious than at any time since the civil war that ended in 1992. Few wanted to discuss politics or criticize Bukele over the phone, unless it was through an encrypted line.

Under Bukele, El Salvador's vibrant journalism scene has also suffered.

The website El Faro, generally regarded as one of the best news organizations in Latin America, has been so severely persecuted by government officials that most of its journalists have had to flee the country.

His reports have exposed alleged secret deals between Bukele and mobsters and drug traffickers, among other corruption scandals.

Bukele has attempted to rewrite aspects of El Salvador’s history, including being a complex political arena that spawned a major revolution, hosting U.S.-backed death squads and giving birth to the only Roman Catholic saint born in Central America. The new El Salvador, he sees, is a haven for tourism and business and is also the region’s champion of bitcoin and a cryptocurrency economy.

He canceled the annual ceremony marking the signing of peace accords that ended the civil war, downplaying a landmark document that ended fighting between guerrillas and a U.S.-backed right-wing government that claimed more than 75,000 lives. He also created a landmark “Truth Commission” that sought to hold accountable those who committed widespread abuses and atrocities.

At first, the Biden administration harshly criticized Bukele’s tactics and even questioned the validity of his re-election. U.S. officials were dismayed by what they saw as a blatant rollback of democracy in a country still receiving nearly $500 million in aid. They imposed sanctions on several Salvadorans.

Supporters wait for El Salvador's President Nayib Bukele outside the National Theater, where he received the credential from the Supreme Electoral Tribunal certifying his re-election in San Salvador, El Salvador.

(Salvador Melendez/AP)

Over the past year, however, Biden administration officials have softened their stance toward Bukele, attributing his reduction in violence to a parallel reduction in the flow of Salvadoran migrants entering the United States illegally. This comes at a time when illegal immigration is becoming a volatile electoral issue.

“We have to work with those who are there,” said a senior administration official, acknowledging the partnership with a sanctioned government.

Noah Bullock, executive director of Cristosal, a leading human rights organization based in San Salvador, says Bukele has created a near-totalitarian regime with a patina of democratic trappings that he can use in his defense. A handful of activists and journalists are allowed to work, he said.

“But any real threat to the political regime that journalism or civil society groups like us might pose is neutralized,” Bullock said. “The entire population is absolutely scared and doesn’t dare to do anything.”

Antonio Avelar, a 73-year-old watch and eyeglass repairman in downtown San Salvador, describes the situation as “bittersweet. We no longer have the dangers of the gangs, but we also no longer have freedom. Here, now, you cannot have an opinion, unless and only if they are favorable opinions” to Bukele.

He worries that his store will soon be displaced by another big change under Bukele: investment from China.

In El Salvador, as elsewhere in Latin America, Beijing has made deep inroads into infrastructure and other projects under what the United States views as unfavorable terms that often end up costing the country more than it gained.

Avelar is among hundreds of vendors who fear they will soon be evicted from the historic city center, where they have worked for years, to make way for more Chinese developments, including a massive library.

“Where I live, there used to be a gang called MS-13 on one side and a gang called 18 on the other, and they were always fighting each other for territory. It was very violent and agonizing,” said Elizabeth Lopez, 62, who sells food near the city center. “We don’t have that anymore, but we can’t say anything bad about the reality of the economic situation either. If you do, you’ll be accused of being a gangster and put in prison.”

A special correspondent in San Salvador contributed to this report.