Recent court filings suggest the Trump administration “misled federal judges, Congress, and the American people” about a deal between the U.S. and El Salvador to detain over 200 Venezuelan migrants at the notorious mega-prison known as CECOT, four Democratic ranking members of House committees said in a letter.
The letter, reviewed by ABC News, was sent Thursday to Department of Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem and Secretary of State Marco Rubio, and calls on officials to turn over any and all agreements between the U.S. and El Salvador, which have not been made public.
The letter cites court filings that appear to contradict the administration’s contention that migrants sent to the prison are solely under the jurisdiction of the government of El Salvador.
Prison officers remove handcuffs from a prisoner to enter a cell at maximum security penitentiary CECOT (Center for the Compulsory Housing of Terrorism) on April 4, 2025 in Tecoluca, San Vicente, El Salvador. Amid internal legal dispute, Trump’s administration continues with its controversial and fast-paced deportation policy to El Salvador, as part of a partnership with President Bukele.
Photo by Alex Peña/Getty Images
According to those filings, submitted July 7 in a case challenging the removal of Venezuelan migrants from the U.S., the government of El Salvador told a United Nations working group that the men in CECOT deported from the U.S. remain the “legal responsibility” of the United States.
“In this context, the jurisdiction and legal responsibility for these persons lie exclusively with the competent foreign authorities, by virtue of international agreements signed and in accordance with the principles of sovereignty and international cooperation in criminal matters,” El Salvador officials said in a report to the U.N.
In their letter, the ranking members said the filing “indicates that the Department of Justice has misled federal courts in assertions regarding the agreement with El Salvador.”
ABC News has reached out to DHS and the State Department for comment on the letter.
The Trump administration has insisted for months that it is unable to return any of the migrants sent to CECOT because they’re under El Salvador’s authority.
In March, the Trump administration invoked the Alien Enemies Act, a wartime authority, to deport two planeloads of alleged Venezuelan gang members to El Salvador as part of a $6 million deal the administration struck with El Salvador President Nayib Bukele to house migrant detainees as part of Trump’s immigration crackdown.
The Trump administration argued that the men who were deported are members of Tren de Aragua which the government has deemed a foreign terrorist organization and a “hybrid criminal state” that is invading the country.
However, one ICE official said in a sworn declaration submitted in federal court that many of the noncitizens who were deported did not have criminal records in the United States because “they have only been in the United States for a short period of time.”
U.S. Representative Jamie Raskin (D-MD) speaks to the media after the U.S. House of Representatives voted to pass U.S. President Donald Trump’s sweeping spending and tax bill, on Capitol Hill in Washington, D.C., U.S., July 3, 2025.
Ken Cedeno/Reuters
The Democrats’ letter also highlighted reporting by The New York Times that said the deal between the U.S. and Bukele, also included an agreement to return some top leaders of the MS-13 gang who allegedly had knowledge of a “corrupt bargain” between Bukele and the gang “that has played a significant role in the decrease in gang violence in El Salvador.” ABC News has not independently confirmed that reporting.
In addition to the U.S.-El Salvador agreement, the lawmakers are asking the Trump administration to provide information about how it screens migrants with valid asylum claims or withholding of removal orders, and Convention Against Torture protection claims before they’re removed from the country.
“Congress has the right and the obligation to conduct oversight over the executive branch and determine what deals our government has struck with a foreign dictator to imprison individuals seized in the United States in an effort to place them beyond the reaches of our courts,” they wrote.
The signers of the letter were Reps. Jamie Raskin, of Maryland; Bennie Thompson, of Mississippi; Robert Garcia, of California; and Gregory Meeks, of New York.
