The number of migrants arriving at the United States’ southern border has increased dramatically over the past six years, and immigration consistently ranks among Americans’ top concerns, including in the run-up to this year’s general election.
For decades, American politicians have been looking for ways to address the root causes of migration, especially from countries in the “Northern Triangle’’ — a term commonly used to refer to El Salvador, Guatemala, and Honduras. A growing group of American politicians and pundits believe they have finally found an answer in Nayib Bukele, the young, hip president of El Salvador.
Bukele and his administration claim that migration from El Salvador to the United States has declined precipitously on his watch. The reason? He says it’s because of his government’s exceptionally forceful crackdown on crime and gangs — making El Salvador safer and its citizens less likely to leave. However, our recent analysis of US immigration data shows that Bukele’s purported success may be vastly overstated.
Once ruled by powerful gangs, El Salvador has gone from having the highest homicide rate in the world to what Bukele says is the lowest in the Americas. He also enjoys unprecedented levels of public support: At least 8 out of 10 citizens approve of Bukele and say that their neighborhoods are more secure. Corporations are paying attention to El Salvador’s transformation, too, and investing in the once unstable country. Google has partnered with the government on initiatives like digitizing health care and education, and its logo sits atop one of the highest skyscrapers in the country’s capital. Cryptocurrency companies are flocking to invest after Bukele declared Bitcoin legal tender.
Given these developments, Bukele contends that Salvadorans are now staying home rather than migrating to the United States. American news outlets and politicians are repeating that claim: “Migration has fallen in recent years under President Nayib Bukele,’’ The Washington Post reported in late June. Politico reported that “Bukele’s iron-fisted crackdown on gangs and crime has led to a dramatic drop in out-migration.’’ Fox News went further, stating on June 8 that Bukele has “stopped migration cold.’’ Senator Tom Cotton cites a “40 percent drop’’ in Salvadoran migration to the United States under Bukele — a zombie statistic that keeps cropping up in news articles.
This narrative — that Bukele’s takedown of the gangs improved life in El Salvador such that far fewer people want to move north to the United States — makes intuitive sense. But the data say otherwise: Bukele’s purported triumph in reducing migration may not be real.
We calculated how many Salvadorans US Customs and Border Protection agents encountered at the US southern border each month from late 2013 through 2024 as a percentage of El Salvador’s national population. For comparison’s sake, we did the same for El Salvador’s neighbors, Guatemala and Honduras.
If Bukele’s crackdown on gangs really did result in less out-migration from El Salvador, we would expect to see the numbers diverge from the levels of migration out of Guatemala and Honduras beginning in 2019 when Bukele took power and then especially in 2022 after his State of Exception crackdown on gangs and crime began.
But the data paint a more nuanced picture: Changes in migration from El Salvador largely mirror those of Guatemala and Honduras in this period. If Bukele’s crackdown in 2022 were responsible for the drop in Salvadoran encounters at the US border, we would expect El Salvador’s trend line to look decidedly different from the other two. Moreover, related research finds no change during Bukele’s tenure in the number of Salvadorans petitioning for asylum in Mexico.
Bukele’s State of Exception policy permits the government to conduct mass arrests and suspend citizens’ right to a trial. Seemingly overnight, El Salvador’s prison population swelled to 109,519 people, about 2.5 percent of the adult population — the highest incarceration rate in the world. Many Salvadorans have told us stories of an innocent family member or friend stuck in prison with no trial or communication. There are numerous accounts of torture and avoidable prison deaths.
Bukele proudly circulates videos of the inhumane prison conditions on social media. “This was literally the most dangerous country in the world. . . . You have to stop that, right?’’ he told Tucker Carlson in June. Bukele strongly defends his policies as the only way to take away gangs’ power, break the cycle of violence, and stop the tide of Salvadorans leaving the country. Keen to find political solutions to the border crisis, both MAGA politicians and a high-level delegation from the Biden administration traveled to El Salvador for Bukele’s second presidential inauguration this June, after which several US representatives praised him as a visionary leader.
But the data on Guatemala and Honduras undercut Bukele’s explanation for migration trends. It’s more likely that something else is influencing migration from all three countries, such as, for example, the US’s contentious Remain in Mexico border policy that began in early 2019, in which border patrol agents began sending migrants with registered asylum claims back to Mexico rather than permitting them to stay in the United States. The Biden administration rescinded the policy in January 2021, but it was reinstated later that year after a federal judge ruled against the suspension of the policy. It remained in place until the US Supreme Court overturned it in June 2022. The program officially ended that fall.
At the very least, it’s unlikely that Bukele’s crackdown alone is responsible for fewer Salvadorans crossing the US border.
In the face of a complex immigration situation, misleading narratives like Bukele’s can be tempting for US politicians. In reality, American policymakers promoting Bukele’s methods are not only falling short in condemning his human rights abuses; they are giving him credit for reducing migration far more than he has. By doing so, they’re supporting an anti-democratic illusion.
Jeffrey Swindle is a college fellow and lecturer in the department of sociology at Harvard University. Matthew Blanton is a doctoral candidate in the department of sociology and the Population Research Center at the University of Texas at Austin.
