Washington — Ten People are en path to the U.S. after a prisoner swap involving the U.S., El Salvador and Venezuela, Secretary of State Marco Rubio mentioned Friday.
The People had been free of Venezuela in trade for El Salvador returning 252 Venezuelans who had been deported from the U.S. to a infamous Salvadoran jail earlier this yr, senior administration officers mentioned, alleging the launched Venezuelans had been members of the gang Tren de Aragua.
A former Navy SEAL, Wilbert Joseph Castaneda, is among the many People launched, three sources advised CBS Information. Castaneda was detained in Venezuela final yr whereas on private journey.
“We now have prayed for today for nearly a yr. My brother is an harmless man who was used as a political pawn by the Maduro regime,” Castaneda’s household mentioned in an announcement. The household mentioned he had suffered a number of traumatic mind accidents throughout his 18 years within the Navy that “impaired his judgment and threat mitigation” and “led him to make a nasty determination to journey to Venezuela.”
The U.S. has warned People towards touring to Venezuela or close to its borders, citing the dangers of wrongful detention.
“Till at this time, extra People had been wrongfully held in Venezuela than every other nation on the planet,” Rubio mentioned in an announcement that credited “President Trump’s management and dedication to the American individuals.”
“Each wrongfully detained American in Venezuela is now free and again in our homeland,” Rubio added.
The U.S. Embassy in Venezuela posted a photograph of the freed People with U.S. diplomat John McNamara.
U.S. Embassy in Venezuela
As a part of the deal, the Venezuelan authorities additionally launched dozens of people that had been described as Venezuelan political prisoners and detainees, a senior administration official mentioned.
Salvadoran President Nayib Bukele wrote on X that his nation “handed over all of the Venezuelan nationals detained in our nation, accused of being a part of the prison group Tren de Aragua,” in trade for “a substantial variety of Venezuelan political prisoners … in addition to all of the Americans it was holding as hostages.”
The Trump administration deported greater than 200 male Venezuelan residents to El Salvador in March, accusing them of being a part of the transnational gang Tren De Aragua. Mr. Trump invoked an 18th-century wartime legislation, the Alien Enemies Act, to order officers to shortly deport most of the Venezuelan migrants, deeming them a risk to the U.S. The Salvadoran authorities has held most of the detainees in a supermax jail known as the Terrorism Confinement Middle, or CECOT.
In Could, the Supreme Courtroom prolonged a pause on deportations of Venezuelan migrants detained in northern Texas whereas they problem their removals beneath the wartime legislation.
A few of the households of the Venezuelan deportees have denied that they’ve gang connections, and a “60 Minutes” investigation in April discovered that many of the detainees didn’t have prison convictions.
The Venezuelan authorities confirmed Friday’s swap, saying in an announcement it “has achieved the discharge of the 252 Venezuelan residents who remained kidnapped and subjected to pressured disappearance in a focus camp, generally known as CECOT, within the Republic of El Salvador.”
Officers describe “down-to-the-wire” deal
A senior administration official mentioned the take care of El Salvador and Venezuela was “basically right down to the wire.” The flight carrying the detainees took off from Venezuela at round 3:40 p.m. ET and left Venezuelan airspace at round 3:55 p.m. The official alleged the Venezuelan authorities took “one final stand” by briefly delaying Friday’s swap as a “energy flex.”
The prisoner swap was organized as Venezuela faces intense U.S. sanctions that restrict the nation’s once-lucrative oil business, and got here at some point after the Trump administration imposed sanctions on six leaders and associates of Tren de Aragua. A senior administration official mentioned Friday’s deal was “humanitarian in nature” and there was “not a dialogue of sanctions in any way.”
Rubio credited Bukele — who has forged himself as a key ally in Mr. Trump’s deportation push — for the swap. Bukele posted on X that his authorities initially proposed the swap to Venezuela’s authorities in April.
James LaPorta,
Charlie D’Agata,
,
Camilla Schick,
Eleanor Watson,
and
Camilo Montoya-Galvez
contributed to this report.
