First he busted gangs. Now Nayib Bukele busts critics • El Salvador’s president has all the tools of repression he needs to stay in power indefinitely

Nayib Bukele’s autocratic tendencies were already clear when he ran for a second term as El Salvador’s president in 2024. He had extended a “temporary” state of emergency for two years, and used it to lock up legions of alleged gangsters without due process. He had ignored court rulings and used soldiers to bully lawmakers into supporting him. After his party won a supermajority in the legislature in 2021, he used it to stack the justice system with cronies. El Salvador’s constitution limits presidents to one five-year term, but those friendly judges waved him through. There was evidence that his government had done deals with the gangs, and bought their support in elections.

Salvadorans did not care. They re-elected Mr Bukele in a landslide, with 85% of the vote. They loved him because he made the streets safe. Gangs had terrorised the country for decades. Mr Bukele ended this by jailing 85,000 people, equivalent to 8% of all young men in El Salvador. Anyone suspected of gang ties—because of a tattoo, a tip-off or a policeman’s hunch—could be locked up indefinitely without trial.

Voters were so grateful that they overlooked the power grabs that came with all this. Only a few liberal voices warned that the strongman would one day aim his weapons of repression more widely.

One year after his re-election, he is doing just that. Journalists who report on his tyranny are being arrested, along with union leaders who question government spending and farmers protesting against land seizures. On May 18th his goons seized Ruth López, a prominent human-rights lawyer.On May 20th his tame legislature passed a law that mimics the repression of Vladimir Putin. Any organisation that receives foreign funds or merely “responds to the interests” of foreigners must register as a foreign agent. It can then be strictly monitored and shut down on a whim. That will be crippling for human-rights groups, anti-corruption NGOs, and so on. Mr Bukele has also empowered himself to rewrite the constitution more easily. Now that the opposition has been neutered and most watchdogs are muzzled, there is little to stop the 43-year-old from remaining “the world’s coolest dictator”, as he styles himself, well into old age.

Mr Bukele’s popularity has started to slip. Many Salvadorans dislike playing jailer for Uncle Sam. Despite safer streets, the economy is lacklustre. Poverty is rising, many public services are dismal and ordinary Salvadorans smell whiffs of grotesque corruption in high places. Recent revelations about Mr Bukele’s cosy relationship with the gangs have been damaging, too. El Faro, a news outlet, reports that gangs helped him win his first big election, as mayor of the capital, San Salvador, and agreed to make the murder rate look lower by hiding bodies better.

A spiral of souring public opinion and greater repression looms. However, Mr Bukele will probably weather it. He has a knack for social media, a powerful propaganda machine and all the tools he needs to crush his opponents.

When a strongman promises to keep you safe by suspending the rule of law, he may succeed for a while. But there will be no law left to keep you safe from him.

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