Trump administration releases MS-13 leaders as part of deal with El Salvador's Bukele
The same leaders his task force once prosecuted are now being traded to El Salvador to avoid testimony about power-sharing deals they had with Bukele
U.S. President Donald Trump intends to drop charges against leaders of Salvadoran gang Mara Salvatrucha-13 (MS-13), currently incarcerated in the U.S. under charges of terrorism, murder, narcotrafficking, and the attempted assassination of an FBI field officer.
A joint task force formed by the Trump administration in 2019 captured 9 MS-13 leaders — to much fanfare — as part of cooperation between the Department of Homeland Security, several other U.S. law enforcement departments, and prosecutors from 5 countries.
The project, called Joint Task Force Vulcan, captured 27 MS-13 leaders in New York, Mexico, Guatemala, and El Salvador. Some of those captured, including nine high-profile cases, were prosecuted in U.S. courts.
Now all of those leaders are being released, and though the “national security” motives of the Trump administration have not been made public, many experts on El Salvador assert that the deals are part of a quid pro quo with Salvadoran President Nayib Bukele, to avoid forcing those leaders to testify about his power-sharing deals with organized criminal groups.
Interim U.S. Attorney for the Eastern District of New York, John J. Durham, has asked the Eastern District Court of New York to drop the charges against two of the nine MS-13 leaders: Antonio López Larios, alias “Greñas”, and Vladimir Antonio Arévalo Chávez, known as “Vampiro”.
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 Salvadoran media company El Faro, Greñas had the charges against him dropped in March 2025 and was immediately deported to El Salvador. Vampiro’s legal team have filed motions to prevent his deportation to El Salvador.
Prosecutor Durham sought to have the charges against Vampiro dropped and his deportation carried out in secret, arguing that “public disclosure of this motion before the operation is complete could cause harm to the government’s relationship with a foreign ally,” referring to the Bukele government.
Multiple media companies have reported that U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio, as part of negotiations with Bukele to accept Venezuelan deportees at the infamous CECOT prison in return for the release of MS-13 members held in the U.S.
From the beginning of his term in 2019 until March 2022, the Bukele administration maintained a secret pact with the three main gangs operating in El Salvador, including MS-13.
Since the highly publicized operation, the Vulcan Task Force has been largely reassigned from MS-13 investigations. It is now responsible for multi-agency coordination against the “Tren de Aragua”, according to public statements from the Department of Homeland Security.
The Bukele government has been accused of grave human rights violations as part of its “temporary” state of emergency, now entering its third year, which grants broad powers to security forces to conduct warrantless arrests, surveillance, and searches of civil society.
A recent public poll in El Salvador found that six out of ten people in the country believe that criticism of the government of Nayib Bukele is likely to land them in jail.
You can also donate a one-time gift via “Buy Me a Coffee”. It only takes a few moments, and you can do so here.
And if you can’t do any of that, please do help us by sharing the piece! We don’t have billionaire PR teams either. haha
Hasta pronto, piratas!