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Speaker 1: One of the most popular politicians in Latin America, has

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Speaker 1: been making some big waves lately Nai Bukele, Nayi Bukele.

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Speaker 1: And lately what Bokela has been receiving the most attention

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Speaker 1: for is his tough approach on crime in El salvadorminalis.

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Speaker 2: I'm going to take the opportunity to send a message

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Speaker 2: to the criminals. There are rumors out there that they

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Speaker 2: want to start taking revenge on honest citizens. Do that

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Speaker 2: and there will be no meal time in the prisons.

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Speaker 1: Bukele has put in place, effectively a state of emergency

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Speaker 1: called a state of exception in El Salvador, which suspends

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Speaker 1: certain civil liberties in the country and makes it easier

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Speaker 1: to arrest people.

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Speaker 3: The freedom to meet with whoever you want on the streets,

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Speaker 3: the freedom to know why you're getting detained. It also

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Speaker 3: increases the amount of time you can be detained.

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Speaker 1: That's my colleague Marcelo roche Brun, one of Bloomberg's bureau

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Speaker 1: chiefs in Latin America, and he says these kinds of

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Speaker 1: security measures put in place under Bukele have resulted in

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Speaker 1: a massive increase in the number of people being imprisoned

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Speaker 1: in the country and what.

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Speaker 3: This has resulted in is an unprecedented wave of detentions.

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Speaker 3: But Salvare is a small country, but its prison population

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Speaker 3: has more than tripled in the past twenty two months.

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Speaker 1: Since these security measures have gone into effect. The country's

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Speaker 1: homicide rate has dropped by eighty four percent from what

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Speaker 1: it was in twenty eighteen, the year before Bukeley became

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Speaker 1: president up until now, but human rights advocates are raising

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Speaker 1: the alarm about the conditions in the prisons where all

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Speaker 1: these newly arrested people are being sent and some Salvadorians

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Speaker 1: think the plan has gone too far. Today, on the show,

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Speaker 1: how Al Salvador's success in fighting crime has come at

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Speaker 1: the expense of civil rights and how Bukele's security strategy

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Speaker 1: could impact his reelection campaign and inspire other leaders across

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Speaker 1: the region to follow suit. I'm your host, Sarah Holder,

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Speaker 1: and this is big take from Bloomberg News. Bukele came

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Speaker 1: onto the national scene after serving as mayor in a

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Speaker 1: small town and in the nation's capital. When he ran

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Speaker 1: for president in his late thirties, he ran outside of

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Speaker 1: the two party system.

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Speaker 3: He's a politician who has built an identity really around

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Speaker 3: this notion that he's different from the establishment.

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Speaker 1: That's Marcello again.

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Speaker 3: He won with more than fifty percent of the votes,

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Speaker 3: and he was you know, he was young. He was

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Speaker 3: thirty seven years old when he was elected. He was

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Speaker 3: running on an anti corruption platform.

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Speaker 1: Bukele took office in twenty nineteen, and he briefly gained

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Speaker 1: some notoriety a couple years later. In twenty twenty one,

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Speaker 1: when he adopted bitcoin as legal tender in the country.

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Speaker 1: President Naya Bukele announced that El Salvador would be the

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Speaker 1: first country to make bitcoin an official currency.

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Speaker 3: Having gone to Elsalvather, I can say that bitcoin is

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Speaker 3: definitely not whitely used does a coin.

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Speaker 1: But things took a turn in twenty twenty two.

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Speaker 3: El Saloposi men Masco school, but changed everything was what

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Speaker 3: happened in March twenty twenty two.

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Speaker 1: In a span of two days, dozens of people were

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Speaker 1: killed by gangs. Al Salvador went through its single most

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Speaker 1: violent day since its civil war ended thirty years ago.

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Speaker 3: When sixty two people were killed over a span of

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Speaker 3: twenty four hours.

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Speaker 1: Before this incident, gangs had been a regular part of

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Speaker 1: daily life for people in Al Salvador.

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Speaker 3: People had grown used to being extorted by gangs in

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Speaker 3: Al Salvador on a monthly basis or on a weekly

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Speaker 3: basis with recurring demands for payments, with demands for paying

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Speaker 3: a bonus on Christmas to gang leaders.

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Speaker 1: And previous governments had tried different ways of dealing with them.

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Speaker 3: The relationship between political power and gangs in Ol Salvador

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Speaker 3: dates back for years and governments have tried different measures.

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Speaker 3: One of them was called manadura, which is translated into

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Speaker 3: iron fist. Another one was like super and manaaludas were

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Speaker 3: like super iron fists. And it comes and goes, and

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Speaker 3: negotiations have been long standing between gangs and so one

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Speaker 3: thing that occasionally happens is our truces between El Salvathers gangs,

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Speaker 3: the two main ones being MS thirteen and Barrio Disiocho.

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Speaker 1: But after the high profile deaths in March twenty twenty two,

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Speaker 1: Bukele doubled down.

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Speaker 3: That is what triggered the idea that Bukele had to

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Speaker 3: do something much more drastic than what any other government

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Speaker 3: had done before. The way Bukell reacted as president was

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Speaker 3: he demanded this state of exception. So in the case

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Speaker 3: of Il Salvador, it suspends the freedom to gather and

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Speaker 3: meat for whatever reason. It suspends the privacy of communications

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Speaker 3: between peoples. Your communications can be either be read or

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Speaker 3: heard by authorities without a warrant.

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Speaker 1: The State of exception was approved by Congress shortly after

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Speaker 1: the twenty twenty two massacre, and it led to a

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Speaker 1: ma wave of arrests. One of the people who was

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Speaker 1: arrested that year was a twenty two year old woman

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Speaker 1: named Carlo Michelle. Marcello spoke to her father. Alfredo lives

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Speaker 1: in the outskirts of San Salvador. He's sixty years old.

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Speaker 1: He owns a small photo studio in the commercial part

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Speaker 1: of town, and he told Marcelo what he knew about

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Speaker 1: the day Carlo was arrested. He says Carlo was accompanying

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Speaker 1: a friend to the bank. Carlo waited for her outside,

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Speaker 1: and when Carlo's friend came out to meet her, she

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Speaker 1: was gone. He says. The security guard had seen her

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Speaker 1: get arrested, and the friend called Alfredo and his wife

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Speaker 1: to let them know. They had no idea why she'd

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Speaker 1: been arrested, but when Alfredo called their local police precinct,

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Speaker 1: they told him it was just going to be a

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Speaker 1: fifteen day investigation and then Carlo would be free. That

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Speaker 1: was nineteen months ago Investigalo Carla is still being held

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Speaker 1: and Alfredo says the only thing he's been told is

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Speaker 1: that she was arrested for not carrying an ID. And

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Speaker 1: Marcello says the situation Alfredo's daughter is in is not

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Speaker 1: uncommon because under the state of exception, not only were

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Speaker 1: certain civil liberties suspended, like the ability to gather in

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Speaker 1: public at certain times, it.

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Speaker 3: Also suspends the right of being informed for the reason

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Speaker 3: for an arrest and of having a lawyer if you wish.

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Speaker 3: It also extends the amount of time that you can

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Speaker 3: be detained without any kind of judge involvement.

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Speaker 1: So, without any clear legal path to get his daughter

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Speaker 1: out of prison, Alfredo started looking online for answers.

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Speaker 3: He started on Facebook groups and WhatsApp groups, and it

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Speaker 3: became clear Welfredo that this was not just an isolated incident,

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Speaker 3: that it was not just his daughter who had been detained,

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Speaker 3: and he started connecting with other parents who were looking

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Speaker 3: for their missing children.

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Speaker 1: Alfredo has started a small NGO for family members who

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Speaker 1: have had someone be abruptly arrested under the current security measures.

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Speaker 3: It's called movir and they say they don't represent any

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Speaker 3: person whose children have been detained, that they make sure

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Speaker 3: to ask for older facts of the case to ensure

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Speaker 3: that they are not defending somebody who may have been

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Speaker 3: detained for belonging to a gang, but only defending people

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Speaker 3: who have been detained innocently.

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Speaker 1: After the break, we go inside one of El Salvador's

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Speaker 1: newest prisons and we hear about how the so called

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Speaker 1: Bukele plan is spreading across Latin America. Hey, we're back.

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Speaker 1: Before the break, we were talking about the thousands of

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Speaker 1: new arrests under El Salvador's state of Exception, and all

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Speaker 1: of these new arrests have created a problem for the

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Speaker 1: country's prison system, which has quickly become overcrowded in the summer.

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Speaker 1: After the deaths. In twenty twenty two, Bukele began building

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Speaker 1: a mega prison called the Seacot.

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Speaker 3: It is one of the biggest prisons in the world

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Speaker 3: and it has a capacity for forty thousand people. And

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Speaker 3: we visited this prison, which is indeed brand new.

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Speaker 1: In video footage of the prison, some of it published

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Speaker 1: by the government, rows and rows of shirtless men kneel

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Speaker 1: on the ground, their heads are bowed.

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Speaker 3: It is currently only holding twelve thousand inmates. That means

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Speaker 3: that the remaining would be eighty eight thousand. Prisoners in

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Speaker 3: Ol Salvador are being held in the old jails, in

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Speaker 3: the same jails that were already crowded before the state

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Speaker 3: of Exception, and those prisons are much harder to get into.

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Speaker 1: And what's happening inside those prisons has become a source

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Speaker 1: of concern in the country.

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Speaker 3: Human rights organizations in Al Salvador say they have heard

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Speaker 3: thousands of claims of abuse in these prisons. In particular, Cristosile,

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Speaker 3: one of the human rights organizations most active in Al Salvador,

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Speaker 3: has documented two hundred and fifteen deaths so far in

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Speaker 3: during the state of Exception. We asked the government about

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Speaker 3: these numbers. We as their security minister Gustavo Bietoro directly

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Speaker 3: how many people have actually died in prisons in An Salvador,

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Speaker 3: and he wouldn't say.

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Speaker 1: In Carcels Alredor del Mundo semu prisoners PTA. He said

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Speaker 1: that prisoners die for many reasons in every part of

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Speaker 1: the world.

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Speaker 2: Look at okay Una.

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Speaker 1: Na.

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Speaker 3: He said.

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Speaker 1: They try to avoid having prison personnel be responsible for

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Speaker 1: any deaths and that giving a number would play into

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Speaker 1: the interests of NGOs. For Salvadorians, this state of exception

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Speaker 1: has been complicated. On one hand, there are accusations that

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Speaker 1: the government has gone too far and arrest people who

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Speaker 1: are not guilty of any crime, and there are reports

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Speaker 1: of widespread abuse and deaths inside the prisons. On the

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Speaker 1: other hand, the country's homicide rate is lower than it's

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Speaker 1: been in decades. We ask Marcelo how people are holding

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Speaker 1: these conflicting realities in their minds.

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Speaker 3: It's different to talk about gangs while living surrounded by

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Speaker 3: gang activity than to talk about them from the outside. Right,

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Speaker 3: this idea that you have a state of exception which

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Speaker 3: suspends civil liberties, which is true, is one thing on paper,

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Speaker 3: and it's another thing on the ground. You're suspending right

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Speaker 3: of assembly, the right to go out. But people in

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Speaker 3: territories controlled by gangs will tell you that they don't

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Speaker 3: have that freedom to begin with, So whether the government

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Speaker 3: suspends it or not does not impact necessarily the freedom

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Speaker 3: that they have. That is why we see in different

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Speaker 3: countries in Latin America these attitudes where people feel that

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Speaker 3: the government should be able to encroach more on civil

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Speaker 3: rights in the name of security, and they point to

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Speaker 3: Al Salvador as sort of a successful example. There are

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Speaker 3: many caveats to that, but a very important one is

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Speaker 3: how long can that go on for? How long is

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Speaker 3: it healthy to give the government so much power. It

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Speaker 3: has been extended for a long time, and it does

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Speaker 3: make a lot of people wonder if this is sort

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Speaker 3: of the new reality, the new normal. We're talking about

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Speaker 3: twenty two months and counting.

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Speaker 1: And while the people of El Salvador grapple with this tension,

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Speaker 1: Bukela's moves are being watched closely by other leaders around

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Speaker 1: the region.

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Speaker 3: One of the things that we've seen in Latin America

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Speaker 3: recently is rising gang violence throughout the region, and the

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Speaker 3: one nation buckling that trend is El Salvador. So that

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Speaker 3: has led to Bukel's profile rising in the region. A

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Speaker 3: couple of examples that we've seen very recently, for example,

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Speaker 3: is Ecuador, where gangs have been terrorizing the country lately.

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Speaker 3: Just this year, they took over a TV station and

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Speaker 3: President Daniel Levo of Ecuador has all but declared a

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Speaker 3: war with gangs, and one of the things that he

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Speaker 3: has said is that he needs to build new prisons

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Speaker 3: and that the prisons that he's going to build are

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Speaker 3: going to be very similar to what Bukele has built

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Speaker 3: in ot Salvadora is Buna Castile, Peru were and based

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Speaker 3: mayors in Lima the Capitol. Mayors of different neighborhoods of

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Speaker 3: the capitol have been demanding that the president adopted Bukell

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Speaker 3: style measures.

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Speaker 1: These measures are often referred to as the Bukele Plan,

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Speaker 1: and Bukell himself seems to be aware of its popularity.

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Speaker 3: At one point, Bukele even tweeted a poll asking if

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Speaker 3: the Bukela Plan should be implemented in Peru, and more

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Speaker 3: than ninety percent of the people answering this poll said yes.

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Speaker 1: As for Bukele, he's up for re election, so the.

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Speaker 3: Election is on Sunday on Sunday, February fourth, and the

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Speaker 3: polls indicate that Bukel is going to win by a

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Speaker 3: landslide and just absolutely crush his competition. Depending on how

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Speaker 3: you measure the voting, it could be as high as

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Speaker 3: Bukelly obtaining seventy percent of votes while his rivals don't

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Speaker 3: even scratch five percent. He's really one of the most

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Speaker 3: popular politicians in the world right now, and at the

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Speaker 3: same time, Salvadorians are very happy with the state of

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Speaker 3: their democracy. There's this organization in Latin America Latino Vero Metro,

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Speaker 3: that measures the health of democracies across the region. Usually

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Speaker 3: it asks people what they think of their democracy, and

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Speaker 3: the single country where its citizens are most satisfied with

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Speaker 3: their democracy right now is in El Salvador.

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Speaker 1: But Marcello notes that when you look at other indicators,

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Speaker 1: the state of El Salvador's democracy can look very different.

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Speaker 3: When you look at other indicators, such as the Economists,

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Speaker 3: for example, famously has a democracy index, and the democracy

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Speaker 3: index in Al Salvador has been falling since Bukell became president,

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Speaker 3: and in fact, Al Salva under the Economy's ranking ranks

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Speaker 3: among the weakest democracies in the region. So you have

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Speaker 3: this thing right where outside of servers say that the

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Speaker 3: democracy in El Salvador is very weak, but you also

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Speaker 3: have a majority of citizens of El Salvador who say

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Speaker 3: that they're very satisfied with the state of their democracy.

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Speaker 3: So there is definitely a paradox there.

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Speaker 1: Thanks for listening to Big Take from Bloomberg News. I'm

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Speaker 1: Sarah Holder. This episode was produced by Adrian Atapia and

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Speaker 1: Jilda de Carley. It was edited by Caitlin Kenney and

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Speaker 1: Brendan Walsh. It was mixed by Blake Maples. It was

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Speaker 1: fact checked by Tiffany Troy. Our senior producers are Naomi

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Speaker 1: Shaven and Jilda Di Carley. We get editorial direction from

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Speaker 1: Elizabeth Ponso Nicole Beamster. Borr is our executive producer. Sage

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Speaker 1: Bauman is our head of podcasts. Special Thanks to Marcelo

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Speaker 1: Russa Brun for his reporting. Thanks for tuning in. We'll

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Speaker 1: be back tomorrow.

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Speaker 3: Didn't you hear anything