President Bukele’s proposal includes imprisoning US criminals in El Salvador’s largest prison for a fee.

El Salvador’s president has proposed jailing convicts from the United States in his country, an “unprecedented” offer praised by US Secretary of State Marco Rubio.

Nayib Bukele made the offer while hosting Rubio at his Lake Coatepeque residence, outside San Salvador, on Monday.

Bukele said El Salvador is ready to imprison the convicted Americans for payment in a prison he opened a year ago that is the largest in Latin America.

“We have offered the United States of America the opportunity to outsource part of its prison system,” Bukele wrote on X. “The fee would be relatively low for the US but significant for us, making our entire prison system sustainable.”

We have offered the United States of America the opportunity to outsource part of its prison system.

We are willing to take in only convicted criminals (including convicted U.S. citizens) into our mega-prison (CECOT) in exchange for a fee.

The fee would be relatively low for… pic.twitter.com/HTNwtp35Aq

— Nayib Bukele (@nayibbukele) February 4, 2025

Following the three-hour meeting, Rubio told reporters that Bukele “agreed to the most unprecedented, extraordinary, extraordinary migratory agreement anywhere in the world”.

“He has offered to house in his jails dangerous American criminals in custody in our country, including those with US citizenship and legal residency. No country’s ever made an offer of friendship such as this. We are profoundly grateful.”

The US State Department describes El Salvador’s overcrowded prisons as “harsh and dangerous”. The department’s website, in the information on El Salvador, says “in many facilities, provisions for sanitation, potable water, ventilation, temperature control, and lighting are inadequate or nonexistent”.

Rubio added that Bukele was also willing to take back Salvadoran citizens as well as foreign nationals. He appeared to suggest the focus in El Salvador would be on jailing members of Latin American gangs, such as El Salvador’s MS-13 and Venezuela’s Tren de Aragua.

“Any unlawful immigrant and illegal immigrant in the United States who is a dangerous criminal – MS-13, Tren de Aragua, whatever it may be — he has offered his jails,” Rubio said.

Since his return to the White House last month, Trump has put priority on speeding up deportation of millions of people in the US who are without legal status.

Trump has also unveiled plans to detain 30,000 migrants at the US base in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba – a prison that previous Democratic presidents hoped to close.

Bukele, who has launched an unflinching security crackdown in his country, is seen by the Trump administration as a key ally in its migration efforts.

Since taking power in 2019, Bukele’s government has arrested more than 80,000 people, bringing the number of homicides down sharply in what was once one of the world’s most violent countries.

While Bukele’s actions have faced criticism from human rights groups, which have documented mass torture and abuse in the country’s overcrowded jails, he swept back to power last year with the public grateful for the plunging crime.

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Al Jazeera and news agencies