Trump and Bukele met the other day in the Oval Office. The press treated it like another awkward photo op between strongmen. But beneath the headlines and staged soundbites, something more sinister was at work. I published a piece the day after their meeting was announced, expanding on a realization that struck me back in February, when their strange relationship first started to bloom.
To me, they unveiled what increasingly looks like a privately held, state-sponsored human trafficking pipeline controlled by Presidents Donald Trump and Nayib Bukele.
The covert system of exporting U.S. prisoners, including American-born citizens, to foreign prisons under the guise of “immigration enforcement” is functionally a slave trade.
And constitutionally, that’s a ticking time bomb which just blew up.
If It Looks Like Slavery, and Smells Like Slavery…
The United States is now deporting people to El Salvador – not because they’re Salvadoran, not because of any court ruling, and not even because they’ve completed their sentences. It’s happening because Donald Trump, operating under a border-related emergency order and the Alien Enemies Act, has found a loophole big enough to smuggle people in. A system of labor trafficking disguised as law and order.
Bukele, for his part, is happy to build new prisons in El Salvador to house them. In fact, it’s a win-win for the “philosopher king” of the South – cheap labor, global attention, and alignment with a U.S. political faction whose leader treats foreign dictators like business partners. If the United States invades countries or defends those which are held under dictatorial rule, those countries with an open slave trade should probably be on that list. But, if they were: America would have contend with itself.
Read Your Constitution More Often
There’s a reason they’re not advertising the deal: this violates the 13th Amendment of the United States Constitution.
That amendment didn’t just ban slavery; it banned involuntary servitude – except as a punishment for crime, whereof the party shall have been duly convicted. If this debate were happening (which it isn’t) you might hear people argue that if the individual is on death row or something, sending them to El Salvador to work might not be the worst idea ever. However, the 13th amendment has a loophole for prison labor in America from what all precedent and common sense would tell you. That’s why you know something is wrong with the idea of trading prison labor under the guise of lessening the load of the cost implication for Americans. How much money is this *saving* here?
And yet, we now have reports of individuals being sent overseas without lawful deportation hearings, due process, or a connection to El Salvador at all. That slippery slope? We are sliding down it at an alarming rate of speed, and too many Republicans and Democrats are acting like they don’t need to figure anything out until we all hit absolute rock bottom. I’d say, consider this rock bottom, then.
In February, when the Trump deportations to El Salvador began making news, it wasn’t framed as a scandal. It was pitched as some kind of cost savings. Trump literally said he “loves” this idea in general.
A Slave Trade in Disguise
For years, Trump’s base has accepted the idea that he plays tough on immigration. His opponents would even claim that. The amount of times Trump says that the open borders policy of Biden was so stupid, is irksome to say the least. But his policies at the border have less to do with immigration than they do with erosion of basic civil rights. He’s declared multiple national emergencies just like he did under the false narrative of COVID in 2020, allowing him to bypass oversight while claiming success.
If he already “solved the fentanyl crisis at the border,” as his allies in state-run media repeatedly say, then why the need for these extraordinary powers to remain in effect?
Because, that’s how he hides these elements of his real operation.
Using the tools of emergency executive power, Trump has constructed a human trafficking pipeline that started with murky deportations, escalates to lawless prisoner transfers, and ends with American citizens detained abroad in prisons funded by questionable arrangements never disclosed to Congress.
This Isn’t Immigration Policy, It Is a Violation of Our Constitution.
The 13th Amendment doesn’t get discussed much. Perhaps that’s because Americans largely don’t or don’t want to think about their government being involved in the trading of slaves. We like to think of ourselves as a nation that abolished slavery forever. You’ll hear people say things like, “We fought a Civil War over that.” But regretfully, there is now a glaring example where President Trump is dragging us all back to hell. The principle that U.S. citizens cannot be exiled without cause or trial is not optional. It protects us all. Yet this is exactly what Trump and Bukele are doing.
This isn’t just a betrayal of our civil rights laws – it’s treasonous conduct, sold to the American public under the illusion of strength and patriotism. There is often a discussion of whether or not the American President is “above the law.” Democrat politicians often will say things like, “Nobody is above the law” especially when they talk about Trump. The reality is that in some contexts, the American President and even regular law enforcement officers exercise violent or lethal force with powers that far exceed what is allowed to the citizenry; in response to them. Sure we have a 2nd amendment and the right to defend ourselves against tyrannical government, but that’s a hard lawsuit to win.
Nobody Should Be Above the Law on Slavery
So sure, the President can order drone strikes that kill people. Trump even assassinated an Iranian military leader in his last term which may well have been the pretext or rationalization for the October 7th strike on Israel from Hamas, or the Houthis attacking American Naval ships. But you won’t hear Trump take responsibility for any of that. You’ll instead hear him claim those things “never would have happened” if he won in 2020. Not only is there no way to know that for sure, the likelihood is he is actually solely responsible for those retaliatory acts.
But regardless, there is no context under which slave trade is acceptable policy. So there is no defense for this in the context of the pending impeachment process that should be befalling Trump as soon as enough Republicans and Democrats find their courage. The question isn’t whether this is happening.
The question is: why aren’t people able to see it is what it is?
This isn’t a border enforcement plan.
It isn’t a deportation strategy.
This is a slave trade.
I’ve Seen This Trick Before
I know how this works. I’ve seen it before.
In 2020, I investigated a so-called “homeless encampment” that Philadelphia officials and the press promoted—and uncovered a human trafficking front. They shipped people in, manipulated them, and exploited them to fabricate public support for a real estate development project. City officials profited. Reporters lied. And even when I presented the truth, they chose to cover it up. I was challenged by reporters to go to the site and do my own research; which I did. That is how I learned how poorly the press was reporting on the events.
The papers sent literal interns like Ellie Rushing from the Philadelphia Inquirer (one of the people who challenged me) and a freelance writer from Philadelphia Weekly – a publication that no longer exists because I caught them using fake pictures to sell their stories about the Von Colln slave camp. At the time I went hard after the Democrat mayor Jim Kenney.
So I’m not a partisan about this stuff. I’m not registered to a party, haven’t ever voted for Trump, Biden, or any other elected office. But I have exposed corruption in these places, and protested their inhumane treasonous policies just the same.
The same pattern is playing out now – on an international scale.
Trump Family Shadow Diplomacy
Here’s what we know:
- Trump’s son and other GOP officials traveled to El Salvador shortly after Bukele mocked the U.S. justice system in defense of Trump several years ago.
- Trump bragged about their long friendship at the Oval Office meeting, weirdly referencing Trump knowing him since he was “like a teenager.”
- Trump used this most recent meeting to frame his personal relationships as national assets – while admitting, mid-rant, “Who the hell cares, frankly?” when talking about if he or Xi Jinping actually like one another.
Let’s be clear: this is not U.S. foreign policy. This is the Trump family foreign policy, and it’s now being sold as a strength by people who seem comfortable collapsing the distinction between nation and narcissism.
Where Is the Money Going?
No one in the press has asked the this: what financial stake does Donald Trump and his associates have in them? For example, will Steve Witkoff and/or Trump be paying contractors personally for the construction costs?
Trump now has access to the Treasury transaction systems thanks to Elon Musk and the so-called Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE). He also has crypto ties through associates who are supposedly brokering peace deals abroad – when in fact, they’re laying the groundwork for transactional authoritarianism.
Trump’s goal isn’t peace.
It’s profits – including treating human beings as literal currency.
Would You Cash An American Slavery Dividend?
Here’s the dark truth you all need to reckon with:
If this deal between Trump and Bukele saves the U.S. money – on prisons, on enforcement, on whatever else – are we okay with that? What if Trump receives an investment in his cryptocurrency company from the Salvadoran government or Bukele personally, in exchange for this deal? How about if the Trump family reserve of gold was increased by $1,000,000,000 in hard currency as a result? What if you got a tax refund next year, boosted by the fact that American prisoners were outsourced to a dictator and forced to labor in foreign facilities? A line item called “Slavery Dividend” to reward each American taxpayer proportionally. Would you take that money?
Would you call it patriotism? Or would you recognize it for what it is: blood money.
This Pipeline Must Be Broken Before It Spreads
This isn’t just about Trump and Bukele. It’s about whether we let the slave trade return – hidden behind immigration buzzwords, executive orders, and backroom deals done in front of your eyes. This is slavery, like nobody’s ever seen before.
Foreign leaders who deal with Trump should beware:
He’s not negotiating on behalf of the United States. He’s negotiating for himself.
And Americans should ask: If this is what he does with the people we’ve already locked up, what happens when he decides you’re the next enemy of the state?Because once slavery becomes policy again, no one is truly free.
