I don’t understand it. Among all the problems with the Trump immigration actions, the fact that they sent the “wrong person” to that prison in El Salvador is not surprising (and not excusable). They have admitted that he should not have been sent there, and a federal judge has told them to bring him back to the United States. The government had argued, as I understand it, a number of things, including taking the position that once he was out of the country, the judge no longer had jurisdiction, and that once he was out of the country, the government had no way to get him back. In fact, the 20-something year old press secretary of His Lowness said, to a questioning reporter, something like: “You should be talking to the president of El Salvador”.

This pretty much typifies everything, doesn’t it? Total callousness on the part of the government to the individual involved and his family. Total disregard of an order of a federal judge. Total impertinence on behalf of the press secretary. Total disregard of law.

This is what is happening. The government is picking up people off the street whom they believe to be members of a gang that they believe is directed (at least to some extent) by the government of Venezuela, and is sending them (without any due process rights to, for example, prove that they are not members of a gang) to a prison in a third country, El Salvador. Apparently, these arrests are being made on the basis of a name (that’s the problem with the man who they admit was incorrectly arrested) and on the basis of tattoos (Pete Hegseth, watch out, you are next).

Once someone is picked up, they can be put on a plane and sent abroad without even any notice to next of kin. The wife (a citizen of the US) of the individual in question here found out where her husband was when she saw him being herded into the prison in El Salvador while she was watching TV.

How you can arrest someone on the basis, say, of tattoos, or on the basis of name recognition and nothing more, I don’t understand. Neither did the judge, I don’t think. The question of membership in the gang is questionable for many of them, and the entire question of whether the gang is under the aegis of the Venezuelan government is apparently only speculation, if that. Certainly, it is a bad gang, and I guess members have been engaged here in criminal activity, but what about someone who escaped to the US to escape the gang he was forced to be in in Venezuela? Just for example.

We have some sort of arrangement with the Salvadoran government to house people from third party countries whom we send there. But what is that arrangement? Even looking beyond the question of its legality (a real question, of course), what exactly are the arrangements? Is there written documentation of a contract? Or is it a handshake agreement? Or ….. ? Don’t you think we should see what it is?

I doubt that it says: we are going to send you a bunch of folks to imprison. They are from another country. Once you have them, they are yours. You can torture them if you want. You can starve them. You can free them. You can keep them three days, three years or three centuries. They are yours. We are washing our hands of them. If they say we should not have sent them to you, we don’t care. Again, it is up to you. It is like we never saw them.

Horrific. It can’t happen here, can it?

I have to run. Luckily, I have no tattoos, and my name is really not that common, certainly not in Venezuela. I think I am safe. For today.

ERRATA: I now see that the individual I was referring to was actually Salvadoran, not Venezuelan, and I can see how that could complicate things. Everything I said about Venezuelans was, I think, correct, and there are several Venezuelans now in El Salvador who are proclaiming innocence of gang membership.