The 'law and order' Trump administration is quietly moving to drop charges against actual MS-13 gang members. At the same time, it has sent a vast number of immigrants with no evidence of ties to the notorious gang, off to El Salvador's infamous torture prison without due process. I'm sure this couldn't be a quid pro quo for Trump using El Salvador's prison system because he's such a stand-up guy.
The Latin Times reports:
Trump is reportedly willing to drop charges to leaders of one of the most prominent international gangs that hails from the Central American country and has been linked to Bukele.
According to a new report from El Faro, an outlet extremely critical of Bukele, the president has seemingly convinced Trump to drop charges against leaders of the Mara Salvatrucha-13 (MS-13) gang who had been accused of terrorism and ordered to be prosecuted during the first Trump term.
If the charges are dropped, the Republican president would also be tossing the work of Vulcan, a joint task force with great fanfare announced in 2019 as a unit specially designed to combat MS-13, bringing together the Department of Homeland Security, several federal agencies, and ten prosecutors' offices which had operated in five countries.
Notably, the joint task force's work led to the capture of nine leaders of MS-13, all Salvadorans accused of narco-terrorism, human trafficking, murders committed in the U.S., planning the assassination of an FBI agent, and more, El Faro reports.
According to the new report from El Faro, El Salvador's President Nayib Bukele has seemingly convinced Trump to drop charges against leaders of the Mara Salvatrucha-13 (MS-13) gang who had been accused of terrorism and ordered to be prosecuted during the first Trump term.
If the charges are dropped, the Republican president would also be tossing the work of Vulcan, a joint task force with great fanfare announced in 2019 as a unit specially designed to combat MS-13, bringing together the Department of Homeland Security, several federal agencies, and ten prosecutors' offices which had operated in five countries.
Notably, the joint task force's work led to the capture of nine leaders of MS-13, all Salvadorans accused of narco-terrorism, human trafficking, murders committed in the U.S., planning the assassination of an FBI agent, and more, El Faro reports.
According to the outlet, the plan is already in motion. Interim U.S. Attorney for the Eastern District of New York, John J. Durham, asked the Eastern District Court in New York to drop the charges against two of the nine MS-13 leaders: Antonio Lopez Larios, alias "Greñas," and Vladimir Antonio Arevalo Chavez, known as "Vampiro."
Vampiro, eh?
In both cases, Durham argued before the court that there were more important "geopolitical" and "national security" considerations than holding these gang members accountable for the crimes of which they were accused, according to Los Angeles Press.
The geopolitical issue they're referring to might be the Iran-Israel conflict. Speaking of which, a 64-year-old Iranian woman who has lived in the United States for 47 years and has no criminal record was grabbed by ICE agents on Sunday morning while she was gardening outside her home in New Orleans.
NOLA.com reports that she was "handcuffed and placed in the back of a pickup truck by agents who arrived in three unmarked vehicles, a witness said. She was transported to Hancock County, Mississippi, where she spent a night in the local jail before being moved to the South Louisiana ICE Processing Center in Basile."
Mandonna "Donna" Kashanian is a hard-working, taxpaying wife and mother who gives back to her community and even has a cooking channel on YouTube. Sure, she's the real threat, but not the legitimate members of the ruthless MS-13 gang.
I wonder what Kilmar Ábrego García, and so many others, think of this shitshow.