President Donald Trump, during a meeting with Nayib Bukele, El Salvador’s president, in the Oval Office of the White House in Washington, April 14, 2025.
Al Drago | The Washington Post | Getty Images
President Donald Trump is exploring whether he can legally deport U.S. citizens to prisons in Central American countries, the White House said Tuesday.
“It’s another question that the president has raised,” press secretary Karoline Leavitt said when a reporter asked if Trump currently has the power to send Americans to foreign prisons or would need to change the law to do so.
“It’s a legal question that the president is looking into,” Leavitt answered.
She said that Trump “would only consider this, if legal, for Americans who are the most violent, egregious, repeat offenders of crime who nobody in this room wants living in their communities.”
Asked to explain the administration’s view of the law, Leavitt said, “We’re looking at it, and when I have more to share, I certainly will.”
The Trump administration has already deported more than 200 alleged foreign citizen gang members from the United States to El Salvador, where they are in prison.
Trump on Monday said he would like to send “homegrown criminals” to a notorious prison in El Salvador, where the U.S. has already deported some noncitizens.
Trump administration officials told reporters in the Oval Office that day that they could not compel El Salvador to return Kilmar Abrego Garcia, who was deported from the U.S. to his native country as the result of an admitted administrative error.
El Salvador President Nayib Bukele, who was seated next to Trump during the press event, said he would not release Abrego Garcia, who the U.S. alleges is a member of the MS-13 gang. Abrego Garcia’s lawyers deny that he belongs to the gang.
The U.S. Supreme Court on Thursday upheld a federal district court judge’s order that the Trump administration facilitate the return of Abrego Garcia to the United States.
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