El Salvador’s Nayib Bukele just dropped a bombshell video that’s got progressives clutching their pearls. The footage shows Kilmar Abrego Garcia, a deported MS-13 suspect, living it up in prison—gardening, playing soccer, even fishing—while his lawyers cry torture. It’s a masterclass in shutting down narrative-driven lawfare with cold, hard evidence.
Fox News reported that President Bukele released this video to debunk claims that Abrego Garcia was mistreated during his detention at El Salvador’s Terrorism Confinement Center (CECOT).
The Trump administration sent Abrego Garcia back to El Salvador in March 2025, accusing him of MS-13 ties, human trafficking, and domestic abuse. A U.S. judge later ruled the deportation was a mistake, and he was shipped back to America.
Abrego Garcia’s legal team painted a grim picture of his time at CECOT, alleging beatings, sleep deprivation, and psychological torment. Court documents claim he lost 31 pounds in two weeks and was forced to kneel for hours nightly. Yet Bukele’s video shows a man who looks anything but starved or battered, casually enjoying prison life.
The saga began when the Trump administration labeled Abrego Garcia a terrorist for his alleged MS-13 affiliation.
White House Deputy Chief of Staff Stephen Miller argued this designation barred him from U.S. immigration relief. President Trump even flashed a photo of Abrego Garcia’s knuckle tattoos, tying them to the gang’s imagery.
Upon landing at CECOT, Abrego Garcia’s lawyers say he was frog-marched to his cell, kicked, and beaten with batons. They claim guards left visible bruises and forced detainees to sleep on metal mattresses with minimal food.
These accusations fueled Democratic outrage against Trump’s deportation policies, with Abrego Garcia becoming a poster child for their cause.
But Bukele’s footage tells a different story, showing Abrego Garcia working out, playing chess, and watching TV. “If he’d been tortured, sleep-deprived, and starved, why does he look so well in every picture?” Bukele quipped. The video’s a sharp jab at activists who take criminal claims at face value without question.
Abrego Garcia’s legal filings describe CECOT as a hellhole where detainees faced psychological torture, including threats of being thrown into cells with violent gang members.
Human rights groups, cited by the Associated Press, have echoed these concerns, reporting hundreds of deaths and widespread torture in El Salvador’s prisons. Yet Bukele’s video suggests at least some inmates enjoy surprising freedoms.
In mid-April 2025, Abrego Garcia was moved from CECOT to a lower-security prison in Santa Ana. His lawyers continued to push the torture narrative, claiming he was a victim of Bukele’s brutal anti-gang crackdown. That crackdown, part of a state of emergency, has detained over 1% of El Salvador’s population, slashing the homicide rate to 1.9 per 100,000 in 2024.
Bukele’s no-nonsense approach has turned El Salvador from a gang-ridden nightmare into one of the safest countries in the Americas.
Compare that to the U.S., where the homicide rate was 5.5 per 100,000 in 2023, and you see why Bukele’s methods resonate with conservatives tired of soft-on-crime policies. Still, the human rights complaints can’t be dismissed outright—some detainees likely face harsh conditions.
Sen. Chris Van Hollen met Abrego Garcia in San Salvador on April 17, 2025, and reportedly found him in good health. “Photos show he gained weight while in detention,” Bukele said, pointing to footage from multiple days, including the senator’s visit. This undermines claims of starvation and abuse, exposing cracks in the progressive playbook.
Bukele didn’t stop there, taking a swipe at the broader Western system: “Anything a criminal claims is accepted as truth by the mainstream media and the crumbling Western judiciary.”
It’s a zinger that hits home for those frustrated by what they see as a gullible, woke-leaning establishment. The video’s release feels like a deliberate poke at sanctimonious critics who ignore results for the sake of ideology.
Abrego Garcia, who lived in Maryland after entering the U.S. illegally, became a cause célèbre for Democrats opposing Trump’s mass deportation plans.
His story was meant to highlight the cruelty of those policies, but Bukele’s video flips the script. It suggests he was less a victim and more a beneficiary of El Salvador’s prison system—at least compared to the horror show his lawyers described.
For conservatives, Bukele’s approach—tough on crime, dismissive of whining—is a refreshing contrast to the hand-wringing of progressive elites. His success in slashing crime rates proves that strong leadership can deliver where lenient policies fail. Yet empathy for those caught in the system, even if guilty, keeps the conversation grounded.
