More on Indefensible Behavior
A reminder the US government sent people to CECOT who were then tortured.
As we likely recall, earlier this year the Trump administration deported a number of persons to El Salvador. At least 280 individuals, mostly Venezuelans, were sent to the prison in March and April of this year. For additional refreshers, see the following posts.
- El Salvador Offers to be an Out-Sourced Prison for the US
- Can We Call Them “Disappearances” Now?
- Being Sent to CECOT is an Inhumane, Slow-Motion Death Sentence
The issue of CECOT came to mind again because of a recent episode of The Daily, Trump Sent Them to a Notorious Prison. Torture Followed. The podcast was focused on the reporting done in the NYT about 40 Venezuelans who were released from the prison and returned to Venezuela, ‘You Are All Terrorists’: Four Months in a Salvadoran Prison.
The piece documents and confirms what we all knew about CECOT: that the conditions in which prisoners are held in that facility conform to UN definitions of torture.
They said they were punished in a dark room called the island, where they were trampled, kicked and forced to kneel for hours.
One man said officers thrust his head into a tank of water to simulate drowning. Another said he was forced to perform oral sex on guards wearing hoods.
They said they were told by officials that they would die in the Salvadoran prison, that the world had forgotten them.
When they could no longer take it, they said, they cut themselves, writing protest messages on sheets in blood.
“‘You are all terrorists,’” Edwin Meléndez, 30, recalled being told by officers who added: “‘Terrorists must be treated like this.’”
I just want to note that our government sent these men to be treated like this simply because they were illegally in the United States. Some may have committed actual crimes, others not; we actually don’t know because there was no due process deployed.
Like with the murders of persons on boats in the Caribbean, the only “due process” is the declaration of guilt by the administration.
We are simply told that those who were deported were gang members and the “worst of the worst” the same way that people on boats can be summarily classified as “narco-terrorists.”
Do I have to point out that being a gang member, even if proven in court, does not mean that indefinite imprisonment in a torture prison is a legal option?
Do I have to point out that drug smuggling does not carry the death penalty?
Do I have to point out that we are talking about human beings here?
Do I have to point out that this behavior, the treatment of a specific group as sub-human scapegoats that can be treated worse than farm animals, sounds like evil regimes and ideologies of the past?
Or will Stephen Miller and friends get their feelings hurt for being compared to Nazis and fascists?
Will a reader of this think me infected by Trump Derangement Syndrome for pointing out what is happening in the open, right in front of our noses?
Note the photo above wherein Secretary Noem, dressed up for a social event (maybe a football game?), posed in front of men caged like animals who were subject to torture.
And note that not only were conditions in CECOT known before these men were sent there, but the reporting about the Venezuelans who were released confirms the horrors in question and that the current administration does not care.
From the podcast cited above:
Michael Barbaro
[…] this sounds like a spokesperson for the White House basically saying to “The New York Times,” we’ve seen all your reporting. We’ve seen these accounts of torture of men we put in this prison. And our response is who cares? Which is very striking.
Julie Turkewitz
Correct. And I should mention that the legal door is still open for the Trump administration to continue sending people to El Salvador.
None of this is just. None of it is humane. And the administration is doing all of it knowingly.
********************@
It’s not just that they don’t care. It’s that they actively want to be as scary and threatening as possible. They think this will solve problems. It will not. It will just promote escalation.
It’s not that different than the claims that bombers alone could defeat the Nazis. Who could tolerate bombs getting dropped on them every day? It turns out, lots of people can.
Kristi Noems former dog, Cricket, would not find this surprising at all. So often, who a person really is sits there right in front of you in plain sight, but it is often ignored.
Were only 40 of the 280 were deported to Venezuela or did the NYT only talk to 40? I was under the impression that all of the CECOT prisoners had been sent to Venezuela or at least out of CECOT. I hope I am correct.
Also, what’s the current status of Abrego Garcia?
Vile stuff that deserves to be highlighted. Trump’s regime is definitely not beating the Nazi allegations.
Once upon a time: “Have you no decency, sir?” which marks the beginning of the end of McCarthy’s influence as the senator’s cruelty is exposed and rejected by the public.
Fast forward to today: “None of this is just. None of this is humane.” which doesn’t bring denial, defense or a shift in power to influence, but rather “How nasty! Your pointing out my nazism is what is truly indecent” while the public is unengaged at best and cheering on at worst.
I did not have nostalgia for McCarthyism on my lifetime bingo card.
There’s a piece in Politico about Noem possibly leaving DHS, with several people saying her 2028 aspirations are part of what might be fueling these rumors.
I…find this astonishing. That vacant, zombie eye-glaze, the costume changes, the *admitting (bragging about?) shooting her dog*… this is a person who should quickly fade into obscurity, not become a plague on the next election cycle.
@Jen:
Indefensible behavior is a feature, not a bug, with these people.
These villains quickly fading into obscurity would appear too much to ask for. It may be that the most we can hope for is to prevent the indefensible from becoming ubiquitous.
@Jen:
Wonderful! Just lovely! Can’t wait for the inevitable Paglia commentary (subsequently cited in a Miranda Devine NYP op-ed and amplified by Rowling on X) praising Noem as a feminist icon.
Maybe even get a reappearance by Amy Wax. After all, nothing arouses a careerist ‘feminist’ who loves to tell other women to get in the kitchen more than a chance to race-bait.
@Jen:
You could say the same of Trump, but he’s been President twice, so obviously it really doesn’t matter how horrible someone is as long as they run as a Republican. Being horrible probably helps, actually.
@Mikey:
Lenin had a simplistic, amoral code of ethics: whatever helped the revolution was good; whatever hurt it was bad.
This is kind of situational ethics, or an extreme form of consequentialism, but what it boils down to is Lenin could do whatever he wanted if he thought, or could rationalize, that it helped the revolution.
So, forced labor camps, persecution, censorship, summary executions, etc.
El Taco seems to have a similar notion, but centered more on what he thinks makes him look good, and to a lesser extent what benefits him. That’s more similar to Stalin’s take.
I’d argue it’s a difference in degree. See concentration camps, persecution, censorship, extrajudicial executions, torture, etc.