Photo courtesy of Gobierno Danilo Medina via Flickr. Bukele, pictured above, was re-elected as El Salvador’s president.
By Kiera McLaughlin ’26
Global Editor
The re-election of Nayib Bukele in El Salvador has brought strong controversy among the international community. On Feb. 5, 2024, President Bukele appeared to have won the election with 83% of the vote, at 70% of the votes counted, winning with a strong majority, BBC News reported.
Bukele has become one of Latin America’s most popular leaders due to his successful efforts to decrease gang violence in El Salvador drastically, France 24 reported. He has described himself as “the world’s coolest dictator,” according to BBC News.
Along with his party, Nuevas Ideas, Bukele has become popular based on his hard stance on crime, which has, in turn, decreased murder rates in El Salvador, according to El Salvador’s security forces, BBC News reported.
Before Bukele’s first term as president, gangs had controlled over 80% of El Salvador for three decades, and led to about 120,000 civilian deaths, France 24 reported.
After being elected in 2019, Bukele was set on changing the violent gang-controlled environment. In March of 2022, during a state of emergency, his administration arrested over 75,000 confirmed and suspected gang members, France 24 reported.
Human rights organizations claim that thousands of Salvadorans have been falsely arrested in this attempt to end gang violence, according to BBC News. Amnesty International released a statement after the results of the election, declaring that “The international community must stay vigilant and use all resources and mechanisms at its disposal to halt and reverse the abuses and state violence that are jeopardizing human rights in El Salvador,” Ana Piquer, Americas director at Amnesty International, stated.
When Bukele publicly announced his victory, he also congratulated his party for winning at least 58 of the 60 National Assembly seats. He declared, “This will be the first time where one sole party rules a country in a completely democratic system. We pulverized all of the opposition [in the polls],” BBC News reported.
According to the El Salvador Times, the opinion polls before election day showed Bukele winning the presidency with a strong majority and support for the Nuevas Ideas party as a whole.
Human Rights Watch has described the Bukele administration’s actions as “an assault on democratic institutions, including summarily replacing the attorney general and all the judges in the Supreme Court.” The organization continued to explain that during the state of emergency, “security forces arrested tens of thousands of people, including hundreds of children, and committed widespread human rights violations, including arbitary arrests, enforced disappearances, and torture and other ill-treatment of detainees.”
When asked in an interview with the Mount Holyoke News about why Bukele has such strong support from Salvadorans despite such allegations, Dr. Dimaris Barrios-Beltrán, a visiting professor of Spanish who teaches a course on Latin American Cultures that covers Salvadorian politics at Mount Holyoke College, said that “many Salvadorans view him as the best president they’ve ever had. They are willing to overlook these issues, persuaded that his firm stance on crime is enhancing their country’s safety and image. They seek immediate change, and in their view, Bukele is delivering.”
Dr. Barrios-Beltrán continued, “Human rights activists and organizations indeed have substantial reasons for concern regarding President Bukele’s second term. … They must intensify their efforts to demonstrate to Salvadorans that this emerging form of democracy may indeed mask an authoritarian regime.”
In addition to human rights organizations rallying against Bukele’s administration, there has been controversy over his re-election, BBC News reported. In the Salvadoran Constitution, he is banned from being president for a second consecutive term, but he stepped down a few weeks ago to ensure he could run again, according to BBC News. Bukele will officially take office in June.
While Dr. Barrios-Beltrán commented on how Bukele’s administration might distance itself from democratic ideals, she explained that there could be a “glimmer of hope.” In El Salvador, local journalism has continued to be targeted by the government, but Dr. Barrios-Beltrán pointed out that “social media emerges as a crucial platform. It has the potential to educate the public, foster change, and unveil truths that are otherwise obscured.”
As Bukele’s second term unfolds and human rights organizations, along with the international community, respond, Dr. Barrios-Beltrán stressed that “empowering Salvadorans through knowledge and exposing them to unfiltered information can inspire a push for transparency and genuine adherence to democratic principles.” She continued to explain that “an informed populace is crucial for advocating a society that respects both the will and the rights of its people, steering the country towards true democracy and civil integrity.”
