The Guardian reports, wiping away tears;
His New Ideas party is expected to win almost all of the 60 seats in the legislative body, tightening its grip on the country and bestowing Bukele, the most powerful leader in El Salvador’s modern history, with even more sway.
“All together the opposition was pulverised,” Bukele, standing with his wife on the balcony of the National Palace, told his supporters. “El Salvador went from being the most unsafe [country] to the safest. Now in these next five years, wait to see what we are going to do.”
New Ideas’ electoral success means Bukele will wield unprecedented power and be able to overhaul El Salvador’s constitution, which his opponents fear will result in scrapping of term limits.
Wildly popular, Bukele has campaigned on the success of his security strategy under which authorities suspended civil liberties to arrest more than 75,000 Salvadorans without charges. The detentions led to a sharp decline in nationwide murder rates and fundamentally altered a country of 6.3 million people that was once among the world’s most dangerous.
Again – when they tell you who they are, believe them.
Bukele faced challenges with this election, as El Salvador initially didn’t allow a president to hold successive terms, which created turmoil within the country as leadership would change every five years regardless of the people’s will. With the aid of the Supreme Court, Bukele changed the rules to allow himself to run again. When he made the rule change, El Salvadorans took to the streets to celebrate, as Bukele boasts over a 90% approval rating in the country.
In the United States, however, the mainstream media took to calling Bukele a “dictator.” Much like we’ve seen with how they treat President Trump, news outlets began calling Bukele running for re-election a “threat to democracy.”
This message was amplified this week by Rep. Ilhan Omar, who put in a resolution for the U.S. to intervene in El Salvador’s elections. She posted to X, “I led Members of Congress in sending a letter to @SecBlinken urging action on threats to democracy in El Salvador. The State Dept must review its relationship with El Salvador and defend democratic values. The Salvadoran people deserve free and fair elections without fear of repression.”
