Apart from their names, made public in a leaked document published on the evening of March 20 by CBS News, the public still knows little about the 238 Venezuelans expelled four days earlier from the United States to a notoriously cruel prison in El Salvador, as they were denied due process in an immigration court.
According to social media posts and interviews with Venezuelans who identified relatives in the pictures and TV footage of the alleged gang members, some had requested asylum in the United States, granted to those who demonstrate a well-founded fear of persecution in their home country. The five plaintiffs in the class action lawsuit filed by civil rights groups to stop the deportations, J.G.G. v. Trump, are also seeking asylum.
In court documents filed on March 19, the Trump administration admitted that some of the Venezuelans deported did not have a criminal record. However, since they doubled down on their claim that these immigrants were associated with Tren de Aragua then, they argued, “the lack of information about each individual actually highlights the risk they pose.”
Cobbled together, this information speaks of the plight of the Venezuelan diaspora — criminalized both in their home country and the United States.
“You feel a double persecution,” said Beatriz Borges, executive director at the Justice and Peace Center (CEPAZ), a nonprofit promoting democracy and human rights. “One starts to feel in the United States the same persecution experienced in Venezuela, the same uncertainty because of the collapse of the institutions that protected you.”
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Based in Houston, Borges said that most of her compatriots residing in the U.S. were forcibly displaced from their home country. “Many come against their will,” she said, “pushed by the humanitarian crisis and the widespread human rights crisis in Venezuela.”
Take the case of plaintiff J.G.G., who is seeking asylum and protection under the Convention Against Torture because of his fears of being killed, arbitrarily imprisoned, beaten and tortured by the Venezuelan police for his political opinions. He was previously jailed and tortured by the Venezuelan authorities.
A professional tattoo artist, J.G.G. was detained after an Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) officer erroneously associated his tattoos with Tren de Aragua. “The sole reason ICE claims that I am a Tren de Aragua member is because of my tattoos,” stated J.G.G, according to court documents.
A federal court ordered to cancel the deportations on March 16. According to media analysis, two airplanes were flying and one was still on the tarmac. The Trump administration allowed the three planes with alleged gang members to arrive in El Salvador. A government attorney claimed in court on March 16 that only the five plaintiffs’ deportation had been delayed. It is not clear, however, if the attorneys have been able to contact the plaintiffs.
The 238 Venezuelans expelled were placed at the Terrorism Confinement Center in El Salvador, part of an enforcement system where people are kept incommunicado under “harsh and life-threatening prison conditions,” according to a 2023 U.S. State Department report.
Local groups estimate that hundreds in Salvadoran prisons have died from malnutrition, blunt force trauma, strangulation and lack of lifesaving medical treatment under the far-right government of Nayib Bukele, a Trump ally who describes himself as the “world’s coolest dictator.”
The United State’s hand in Venezuela’s collapse
Venezuelans are fleeing a country in turmoil. The government of President Nicolás Maduro continues to commit crimes against humanity by persecuting individuals on political grounds, concluded a report on the human rights situation in Venezuela issued by the United Nations on March 18. Non-governmental sources documented the arrest of 84 perceived political opponents, including journalists and human rights defenders, only during the first 15 days of January.
Forcibly displaced from their home country, tens of thousands of Venezuelans have been able to apply for asylum in the U.S. since 2013. However, animosity against Venezuelans has been growing, fanned by the Trump administration, which has turned a gang linked only to a handful of crimes in the U.S. into a terrorist organization that aims at destabilizing the country.
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“There has truly been a systematic attack on the Venezuelan nationality,” said Niurka Meléndez, executive director of Venezuelans and Immigrants Aid (VIA), a volunteer-run organization based in New York. Since March 16, the volunteers at VIA’s network say they are terrified, feeling that a Venezuelan passport is a marker of criminality.
“What have we done as Venezuelans that we have to constantly flee from persecution?” Meléndez said. “Because what is happening to us in the United States is, in some way, persecution.”
Meléndez and her family left Venezuela in 2015, the same year the U.S. severely strengthened its sanctions against the country. Also imposed by the European Union and other countries, the sanctions had a devastating impact on the entire population, especially those in extreme poverty, women, medical workers, individuals with life-threatening diseases, and indigenous peoples, according to a UN Special Rapporteur.
As a consequence, Venezuela registered the largest economic contraction in the history of the Western Hemisphere, leading to the exodus of 7.9 million individuals in less than a decade, of which only 770,000 immigrated to the United States. Some 60,000 arrived in New York City by September 2023.
The forced displacement of millions of Venezuelans facilitated the rise of illicit activities like human trafficking, according to a report issued in January by the World Bank. Through those activities, the exploitation of the most vulnerable, Tren de Aragua became a prominent criminal actor, profiting from migrant smuggling, human trafficking, and sexual exploitation in Peru, Chile, and Colombia, according to the think tank InSight Crime.
Two plaintiffs in the J.G.G. v. Trump lawsuit actually fled Venezuela because of Tren de Aragua, according to the complaint. J.A.V. is seeking asylum in the United States because of his political views and his fears of harm and mistreatment from criminal groups, including Tren de Aragua. Another plaintiff, W.G.H., was extorted and threatened by the gang.
Despite Tren de Aragua’s foothold in South America, InSight Crime has concluded that it has not established a significant presence in the United States and does not appear poised to do so in the future, despite “headlines suggesting the gang is invading” the country. Nonetheless, Venezuelans in the United States feel a growing stigmatization.
Tren de Aragua’s designation as a terrorist organization must not dictate the immigration policy toward Venezuelans, a population highly traumatized and in need of international protection, said Borges. “There is a feeling of helplessness, loneliness, and a lot of fear.”
A hearing is scheduled for Friday March 21 in the federal court that instructed the administration to cancel the deportations, where the parties are expected to discuss if the administration acted lawfully when it deported the Venezuelans.
