Joint statement by Venezuela Solidarity Campaign and Nicaragua Solidarity Campaign Action Group.The Trump administration has invoked the 1798 Alien Enemies Act as a thinly veiled legal pretext to justify the mass expulsion of Venezuelans, Nicaraguans, and others. Some deportees have been sent to detention facilities such as the notorious internment camp in Guantanamo Bay—many were detained without evidence, arrest warrants, or probable cause, let alone justification for imprisonment.
Trump has also taken steps to end birthright citizenship, a move that would disproportionately affect nearly 70 million Latinos in the US. Arbitrary arrests, deportations, and the revocation of documentation—even for legal residents – are escalating daily.
The degrading treatment of detainees—often reminiscent of Guantanamo’s worst abuses—has drawn wide condemnation. While mainstream media has focused on Venezuelans, the New York Times reports that Guantanamo also holds Salvadorans and Nicaraguans, whom Secretary of Defense, Peter Hegseth dismissively refers to as “temporary transit” detainees.
Trump has also revoked the long-standing policy granting automatic permanent residence to Cubans—a right once actively encouraged by the US government. Now, 530,000 Cubans, along with Haitians, Nicaraguans, and Venezuelans who gained status under Biden, face deportation.
Many Venezuelan migrants are being falsely labelled as members of the Tren de Aragua gang on the flimsiest of reasons such as a tattoo in support of a football club, and shipped not only to Guantanamo but also to El Salvador’s CECOT prison—a so-called “Terrorism Confinement Centre” where conditions are subhuman, with reports from El Salvadoran organisations of over 300 deaths in custody, some showing clear signs of violence.
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The Trump administration struck a deal with Salvadoran President Nayib Bukele, paying US$6 million to detain 238 Venezuelans branded “foreign terrorists” by White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt. Amnesty International has condemned the Venezuelans’ expulsion, despite a court order explicitly barring their removal.
The Salvadoran organization Bloque de Resistencia y Rebeldia Popular (BRP) has denounced the Trump-Bukele pact as “arbitrary and dehumanising,” violating international law and making El Salvador complicit in Trump’s xenophobic and criminal immigration policies. It has demanded the El Salvador Supreme Court nullify the detentions.
Venezuelan Attorney General Tarek Williams Saab has petitioned El Salvador’s Supreme Court for habeas corpus relief for detained Venezuelans, while President Maduro condemned the deportations as kidnappings and sought intervention from the UN’s Secretary General and the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights.
A coordinated media campaign—spearheaded by Trump, far-right Venezuelan opposition leader Maria Corina Machado, and US Senators such as Ted Cruz and parroted by the main corporate media outlets—has propagated the myth of a Venezuelan government-backed Tren de Aragua cartel flooding the U.S. with criminals. President Maduro has described this campaign “as the biggest lie ever told about [Venezuela]” and has vowed to fight for the repatriation of every wrongfully detained Venezuelan.
We unequivocally condemn the US government’s egregious violation of migrants’ legal rights. This struggle must now become the focal point for the international solidarity movement, demanding the immediate release of all unjustly imprisoned migrants.
