A few days ago, we covered the news about U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio’s visit to El Salvador as part of his tour of five Latin American countries. El Salvador was the second country Rubio arrived in after visiting Panama.
To provide some context, Marco Rubio had already visited El Salvador before becoming Secretary of State. In 2023, he traveled there to see firsthand what was happening in the country.
At the time, Rubio was somewhat critical of the situation in El Salvador, especially given the rise of authoritarian regimes like Daniel Ortega’s in Nicaragua. Nicaragua is a neighboring country of El Salvador, with which it shares maritime borders.
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Rubio’s visit allowed him to personally assess the situation, and he also met with Nayib Bukele during that trip. Afterward, Rubio shifted from being a vocal critic of El Salvador (on X.com) to someone who sympathized with what was happening in the country.
So, when he met with Bukele at the presidential residence by Lake Coatepeque, he was meeting with someone he already knew. This made their interaction naturally more friendly. Meeting with a familiar face is not the same as meeting someone for the first time.
What stood out during this meeting was a particular moment in an interview with select media outlets when Bukele appeared enthusiastic—something unusual for him. While he typically smiles and remains cordial when receiving visitors, this time, as he answered a press question, he showed a noticeable level of enthusiasm, which is not his usual demeanor.
Let’s take a look at the words Bukele said to the press at that moment:
“There will be a safe country agreement… We are finalizing it, I believe the Secretary (Secretary of State, Marco Rubio) will announce it. We are announcing an agreement that is much more significant on the same topic (regarding El Salvador receiving illegal migrants deported from the United States). I believe it is far more important and has a much greater scope than those agreements made in 2019. In this case, it is something that, well… if we finalize it, the Secretary will announce it… But in this case, it is a much bigger agreement, unprecedented, I believe, in the history of relations—not just between the United States and El Salvador, but, I think, with Latin America as a whole.“
Words of Nayib Bukele in response to press questions at the lake house in Coatepeque, February 3, 2025.
Hours later, in another press conference where Marco Rubio was joined by Alexandra Hill Tinoco, El Salvador’s Minister of Foreign Affairs, Rubio mentioned the proposal that Bukele had made to the U.S. government.
What was the proposal?
The proposal was a business deal. Let’s remember that Bukele comes from a family of immigrants from the former Ottoman Empire who lived in or near Jerusalem. When they arrived in El Salvador, they became merchants.
Over time, Nayib Bukele’s family (not everyone with the last name Bukele, since I personally met a girl with that surname years ago, and as far as I knew, they were not business owners) established multiple companies and businesses. This means Bukele can be considered a businessman, and businessmen must know how to make good deals.
Thus, the proposal made to the United States through Marco Rubio was a business deal—an outsourcing arrangement for part of the U.S. prison system. In other words, El Salvador offered to provide custody services for U.S. prisoners in exchange for a fee.
In El Salvador, the daily cost of holding an inmate is significantly lower compared to the cost of imprisoning someone in the United States.
Bukele offered this outsourcing service at El Salvador’s maximum-security mega-prison, CECOT—a facility capable of housing thousands upon thousands of inmates, under strict surveillance and rigorous security measures. In this prison, inmates have no access to recreational yards and must live in overcrowded cells with dozens of other prisoners.
That being said, the prison complies with correctional standards, as it was built with meticulous attention to detail.
This is the prison where Bukele proposed the outsourcing service, emphasizing that the fee charged to the United States would be minimal compared to the cost of housing each inmate on U.S. soil, yet significant for El Salvador.
With the revenue generated, Bukele plans to fund the country’s prison system—which is already well-financed—but if it can become self-sustaining, even better.
A bit more context: El Salvador has been an outsourcing destination for years, especially in call centers that provide customer service, sales, and technical support to foreign companies (however, El Salvador seeks to become something much better due to the Third Industrial Revolution and has passed laws to become a technology hub).
Despite this, a business opportunity was seen, and now the country aims to apply the same outsourcing model. However, instead of corporate services, it proposed receiving a small portion of U.S. prisoners to serve their sentences in its maximum-security prison, all in exchange for a fee that is only a fraction of what it costs the U.S., but significant for El Salvador.
That is why Bukele appeared enthusiastic when answering the media’s question. He was excited because he was proposing a business deal that would financially benefit El Salvador. Now, it is up to the United States to decide whether to move forward. If they do, the cost of the service would need to be negotiated and agreed upon.
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