In propaganda videos released by the El Salvador government, shackled detainees are led forcefully from the plane as the overhead of drone films.
Music is built, the men are pushed into armored vehicles and taken to a large prison.
Their heads are shaved and the camera rolls around, moving into a large cell in an organized line.
The video features Venezuelan immigrants who have been recently deported from the United States. US officials accused US officials of being a gang member, according to Salvador officials. The clip also shows suspicious members of the MS-13 gang, they said. The deportation flew into El Salvador despite a federal judge ordering the plane to reverse the course and return detainees to the United States.
The three-minute clip, released by the President of El Salvador on Sunday morning, has been watched almost 39 million times across social media over three days and has been played repeatedly on cable news.
The US did not release the video, but it is an extraordinary portrayal of detained immigrants subject to American deportation procedures, which rarely openly broadcast.
However, the style of the video is not new in El Salvador.
President Naive Bukere, a former spokesman who was elected to the country's leader in 2019, has indicted and imprisoned the Salvadoran gangster for a crucial part of his term.
He highlighted his hardline approach to gang violence over the years in sophisticated videos of arrests and incarceration.
“These are usually videos that try to humiliate and dehumanize those detained there.
The Trump administration has made little public about the men, including evidence that they are gang members. Videos like this show how President Trump is making better promises to stop illegal immigration and deport the masses.
Last month, Secretary of State Marco Rubio visited El Salvador. He announced that the country's president has accepted Decortees of all nationalities, including US citizens, and offered to accommodate at a fee at a new MegaPrison called the Terrorism Confinement Center, or a new MegaPrison called the giant site that can accommodate up to 40,000 prisoners.
Opened in 2023 to detain people accused of being members of the gang, the facility was featured in a highly produced video by Bukele's team, showing the relocation of detainees.
“It's a shocking value,” said Ricardo Valencia, a spokesman for the Salvadoras Embassy in Washington since 2010 and 2014, and Fulleraton, a public relations professor at California State University, about the video. “But this tells you how little rule of law is in El Salvador. Cruelty is the point.”
Over the weekend, the Trump administration said it would receive $6 million for Salvador's acquisition of hundreds of deportees. Most of them said they were members of the Venezuelan criminal group Tren de Aragua without providing evidence or names of detainees. Officials said the deal also includes the transfer of about 20 suspicious members of MS-13 awaiting accusations in the United States.
Typically, official portrayals of deportation or detention centres, even if there is a video, do not show the face of the immigrants, and are more cautious and more cautious.
But under Trump, who campaigned on Hardline's anti-immigration stance and a promise of massive deportation, U.S. authorities have presented a new, more visceral propaganda campaign.
Rubio and Elon Musk shared a video of Bukere online. Trump thanked him and said, “I'll never forget!”
Over the past few weeks, the White House has released a video celebrating its deportation efforts.
The White House has also released a styled photo as an “desired” poster for Old West. It features men who have been “arrested” by immigrant staff.
These images, engraved with the White House logo, were promoted to show that the White House said it was determined to comply with the country's immigration laws. However, they publicly shamed immigrants, some of whom were not convicted.
On Monday, the White House posted a clip to X of the Bounded Immigrants set in Semisonic's 1998 rock hit “Closing Timing.”
White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt said the video was intended to encourage “undocumented immigrants to actively self-report, perhaps to save themselves from being in one of these fun videos.”
These types of videos first became commonplace in El Salvador in 2022 after the surge in gang violence in Central American countries led to the government impose emergency situations. The military and police launched a massive arrest campaign, with many people jailed without legitimate procedures.
The crackdown reduced gang violence significantly, but at the same time eroding civil liberties and focusing under Mr. Bukere.
Human rights groups have issued warnings about tens of thousands of detainees (those who have been seduced by those without gang bonds) and the lack of legitimate procedures for the conditions they were held. Over 300 people have died in government custody over the past three years, according to Human Rights Watch.
When Bucchere's administration opened a new detention facility in 2023, we posted a 30-minute guided tour. Since then, they have brought international media and social media influencers to tours that are enjoying the big views on YouTube.
Mr. Bukere's new partnership with the US could further involve the government's production of such propaganda videos.
“We continue to fight organized crime,” Bukere wrote over the weekend along with the video. “But this time, the allies are helping out too.”
Axel Boada provided video production.
