{"id":262424,"date":"2025-03-19T20:50:07","date_gmt":"2025-03-19T20:50:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/2025\/03\/19\/humiliation-as-propaganda-videos-of-shackled-detainees-have-history-in-el-salvador\/"},"modified":"2025-03-19T20:50:07","modified_gmt":"2025-03-19T20:50:07","slug":"humiliation-as-propaganda-videos-of-shackled-detainees-have-history-in-el-salvador","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/2025\/03\/19\/humiliation-as-propaganda-videos-of-shackled-detainees-have-history-in-el-salvador\/","title":{"rendered":"Humiliation as Propaganda: Videos of Shackled Detainees Have History in El Salvador"},"content":{"rendered":"<div style=\"text-align:center\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/i3.wp.com\/static01.nyt.com\/images\/2025\/03\/19\/multimedia\/00prison-dip\/00prison-dip-facebookJumbo.png?ssl=1\" class=\"attachment-post-thumbnail size-post-thumbnail wp-post-image\" alt=\"Humiliation as Propaganda: Videos of Shackled Detainees Have History in El Salvador\" title=\"Humiliation as Propaganda: Videos of Shackled Detainees Have History in El Salvador\" \/><\/div><p> <br \/>\n<\/p>\n<div data-testid=\"companionColumn-0\">\n<div class=\"css-53u6y8\">\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">In a propaganda video released by the government of El Salvador, shackled detainees are forcefully led off planes as drones film overhead.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<aside class=\"css-ew4tgv\" aria-label=\"companion column\"\/><\/div>\n<div data-testid=\"companionColumn-1\">\n<div class=\"css-53u6y8\">\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">The music builds and the men are pushed into armored vehicles and taken to a large prison.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<aside class=\"css-ew4tgv\" aria-label=\"companion column\"\/><\/div>\n<div data-testid=\"companionColumn-2\">\n<div class=\"css-53u6y8\">\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">Their heads are shaved and they are moved in organized lines into large cells \u2014 all while the camera rolls.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<aside class=\"css-ew4tgv\" aria-label=\"companion column\"\/><\/div>\n<div data-testid=\"companionColumn-3\">\n<div class=\"css-53u6y8\">\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">The video features Venezuelan migrants recently deported from the United States, whom U.S. officials accuse of being gang members, according to Salvadoran officials. The clip also shows suspected members of the MS-13 gang, they said. The deportation flights landed in El Salvador <a class=\"css-yywogo\" href=\"https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2025\/03\/16\/us\/constitutional-crisis.html\" title=\"\">despite<\/a> a federal judge ordering that the planes reverse course and return the detainees to the United States.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\"><a class=\"css-yywogo\" href=\"https:\/\/x.com\/nayibbukele\/status\/1901245427216978290\" title=\"\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\" target=\"_blank\">The three-minute clip<\/a>, released on Sunday morning by El Salvador\u2019s president, was viewed almost 39 million times in three days across social media, and was repeatedly played on cable news.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">While the United States didn\u2019t release the video, it is an extraordinary depiction of detained migrants subject to American deportation proceedings, which are rarely so openly broadcast.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">But the style of video is not new in El Salvador.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\"><a class=\"css-yywogo\" href=\"https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2025\/03\/17\/world\/americas\/el-salvador-nayib-bukele-deportees.html\" title=\"\">President Nayib Bukele,<\/a> a former publicist who was elected the country\u2019s leader in 2019, has made prosecuting and incarcerating El Salvador\u2019s gangs a key part of his tenure.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">He has highlighted his hard-line approach against longstanding gang violence with polished videos of arrests and imprisonments, like <a class=\"css-yywogo\" href=\"https:\/\/youtu.be\/aqmWSroZW68?si=1-T_mebJCyQ1O4ma\" title=\"\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\" target=\"_blank\">this heavily produced video from 2023<\/a> showing detainees being moved into a new prison facility.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<aside class=\"css-ew4tgv\" aria-label=\"companion column\"\/><\/div>\n<div data-testid=\"companionColumn-4\">\n<div class=\"css-53u6y8\">\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">\u201cThese are videos that typically humiliate and try to dehumanize the people who are detained there, and in this case deported,\u201d said Juanita Goebertus Estrada, the director of the Americas division of Human Rights Watch.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">The Trump administration has <a class=\"css-yywogo\" href=\"https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2025\/03\/18\/us\/trump-deportations-venezuela-gang.html\" title=\"\">disclosed little<\/a> about the men, including any evidence that they are gang members. It says videos like this show how President Trump is making good on his promises to stop illegal immigration and conduct mass deportations.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">Last month, Secretary of State Marco Rubio visited El Salvador. He <a class=\"css-yywogo\" href=\"https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2025\/02\/04\/us\/politics\/el-salvador-prisons-marco-rubio.html\" title=\"\">announced<\/a> that the country\u2019s president had offered to take in deportees of any nationality, including U.S. citizens, and house them for a fee at a new megaprison called the Terrorism Confinement Center, or CECOT, a hulking site that can house up to 40,000 inmates.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">Opened in 2023 to detain people accused of being gang members, the facility was introduced with highly produced videos by Mr. Bukele\u2019s team, showcasing the transfer of detainees.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<aside class=\"css-ew4tgv\" aria-label=\"companion column\"\/><\/div>\n<div data-testid=\"companionColumn-5\">\n<div class=\"css-53u6y8\">\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">\u201cIt\u2019s the shock value,\u201d Ricardo Valencia, a press officer at the Salvadoran Embassy in Washington from 2010 and 2014, and a public relations professor at California State University, Fullerton, said of the videos. \u201cBut this tells you about how little rule of law there is in El Salvador. The cruelty is the point.\u201d<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">Over the weekend, the Trump administration said that El Salvador would receive $6 million for taking in hundreds of deportees, most of whom <a class=\"css-yywogo\" href=\"https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2025\/03\/18\/us\/trump-deportations-venezuela-gang.html\" title=\"\">the U.S. government<\/a> said were members of the Venezuelan criminal group <a class=\"css-yywogo\" href=\"https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2025\/03\/15\/world\/americas\/tren-de-aragua-gang-venezuela.html\" title=\"\">Tren de Aragua<\/a>, without offering evidence or the detainees\u2019 names. Officials said the deal also included the transfer of about two dozen suspected members of MS-13 who were being held in the United States awaiting charges.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">Normally, official U.S. depictions of deportations or detention centers are more circumspect, not showing migrants\u2019 faces, if there is video at all.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">But under Mr. Trump, who campaigned on a hard-line anti-immigration stance and the promise of mass deportations, U.S. officials have presented a new, more visceral <a class=\"css-yywogo\" href=\"https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2025\/02\/01\/us\/politics\/trump-immigration.html\" title=\"\">propaganda campaign<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">Mr. Rubio and Elon Musk shared Mr. Bukele\u2019s video online. Mr. Trump thanked him, saying, \u201cWe will not forget!\u201d<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">In recent weeks, the White House has released videos celebrating the deportation efforts.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<aside class=\"css-ew4tgv\" aria-label=\"companion column\"\/><\/div>\n<div data-testid=\"companionColumn-6\">\n<div class=\"css-53u6y8\">\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\"><a class=\"css-yywogo\" href=\"https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2025\/02\/01\/us\/politics\/trump-immigration.html\" title=\"\">The White House also released photos styled<\/a> as Old West \u201cwanted\u201d posters, featuring men \u201cARRESTED\u201d by immigration officials, who they say have been accused of crimes like rape, murder and kidnapping.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">These images, stamped with a White House logo, were promoted to demonstrate what the White House says is a determination to follow the nation\u2019s immigration laws. But they also served to publicly shame immigrants, some of whom had not been convicted.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">On Monday, the White House posted <a class=\"css-yywogo\" href=\"https:\/\/x.com\/WhiteHouse\/status\/1901658649522503816\" title=\"\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\" target=\"_blank\">a clip<\/a> on X of a shackled migrant being searched set to Semisonic\u2019s 1998 rock hit \u201cClosing Time.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<aside class=\"css-ew4tgv\" aria-label=\"companion column\"\/><\/div>\n<div data-testid=\"companionColumn-7\">\n<div class=\"css-53u6y8\">\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">The White House press secretary, Karoline Leavitt, said the video was meant to encourage \u201cillegal immigrants to actively self-deport, to maybe to save themselves from being in one of these fun videos.\u201d<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">These types of videos first became common in El Salvador in 2022, after a surge in gang violence in the Central American country led the government to impose a state of emergency \u2014 one that remains in place three years later. The military and the police began a campaign of mass arrests, with many people imprisoned without due process.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">Although the crackdown significantly reduced gang violence, it simultaneously eroded civil liberties and centralized power under Mr. Bukele.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">Human rights groups raised alarms about the lack of due process for tens of thousands of detainees (some people with no gang ties were ensnared), and <a class=\"css-yywogo\" href=\"https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2025\/02\/04\/world\/americas\/el-salvador-prisons-bukele-migrants.html\" title=\"\">the conditions in which they were held<\/a>. More than 300 people have died in government custody in the last three years, according to Human Rights Watch.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">When Mr. Bukele\u2019s administration opened the new detention facility in 2023, it <a class=\"css-yywogo\" href=\"https:\/\/youtu.be\/fuBjhrgYkdM?si=St4EG9nXRtXoLA1t\" title=\"\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\" target=\"_blank\">posted a 30-minute guided tour<\/a>. Since then it has brought international media and social media influencers in for tours that have garnered huge view counts on YouTube.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<aside class=\"css-ew4tgv\" aria-label=\"companion column\"\/><\/div>\n<div data-testid=\"companionColumn-8\">\n<div class=\"css-53u6y8\">\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">Mr. Bukele\u2019s new partnership with the United States is likely to further embolden his government\u2019s production of such propaganda videos.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">\u201cWe continue advancing in the fight against organized crime,\u201d Mr. Bukele wrote alongside the video over the weekend. \u201cBut this time, we are also helping our allies.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<aside class=\"css-ew4tgv\" aria-label=\"companion column\"\/><\/div>\n<div data-testid=\"companionColumn-9\">\n<div class=\"css-53u6y8\">\n<p class=\"css-798hid etfikam0\">Axel Boada<!-- --> contributed video production.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<aside class=\"css-ew4tgv\" aria-label=\"companion column\"\/><\/div>\n<p><br \/>\n<br \/><a href=\"https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2025\/03\/19\/world\/americas\/deportation-videos-el-salvador.html\">Source link <\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>In a propaganda video released by the government of El Salvador, shackled detainees are forcefully led off planes as drones film overhead. The music builds and the men are pushed into armored vehicles and taken to a large prison. Their heads are shaved and they are moved in organized lines into large cells \u2014 all [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":262425,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"tdm_status":"","tdm_grid_status":"","fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/static01.nyt.com\/images\/2025\/03\/19\/multimedia\/00prison-dip\/00prison-dip-facebookJumbo.png","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[173343,202148,5500,66038,163575,177099,28795,3913,14759,90287,172006,86565,173344,21852,170339,58749,181997,52,1021,128437,163486,177098,14553,150857],"amp_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/262424"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=262424"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/262424\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":262426,"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/262424\/revisions\/262426"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/262425"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=262424"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=262424"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=262424"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}