Donald Trump was in high spirits on Sunday, 16 March, after a plane landed in El Salvador carrying 238 suspected members of the Venezuelan gang Tren de Aragua. Despite a federal judge ruling against it, the Trump administration deported them to El Salvador’s mega-prison, claiming the decision was made while the plane was already in international airspace.

Trump used an 18th-century wartime law to justify the move, arguing the U.S. faced an “invasion” from a criminal group linked to kidnapping and contract killings. A deal between Secretary of State Marco Rubio and Salvadoran President Nayib Bukele allowed the prisoners’ transfer to the Terrorism Confinement Centre (CECOT), one of the world’s largest maximum-security prisons.

Bukele posted images of the prisoners, writing, “The first 238 members of the Venezuelan criminal organization have landed,” adding that the U.S. would “pay a very low fee for them, but a high one for us.” He continued, “We are also helping our allies, making our prison system self-sustainable.”

Trump praised Bukele on Truth Social, calling the inmates “monsters sent into our Country by Crooked Joe Biden and the Radical Left Democrats,” adding, “Thank you to El Salvador… We will not forget.”