Elon Musk may still have his rockets and rage-tweets, but there’s a new favourite in the Trumpverse—an iron-fisted millennial with a crypto wallet in one hand and a prison megacomplex in the other. Meet Nayib Bukele: the self-anointed “world’s coolest dictator,” TikTok-savvy, Bitcoin-backing, and now Donald Trump’s closest international ally.
In the latest Oval Office spectacle, Trump welcomed Bukele like a long-lost brother-in-arms. Forget NATO allies or trade partners. This was a power couple made in populist heaven—both allergic to court rulings, both disdainful of the press, and both deeply in love with their own reflection. Musk, once Trump’s techno-muse, just got downgraded to a side character in a new authoritarian bromance.
A Dictator’s Debut: From Streaming Memes to Statecraft
Bukele doesn’t look like a dictator—he looks like a guy trying to sell you NFTs or pitch a startup called “Uber but for revolutions.” Baseball cap turned backwards, clean beard, fluent in Twitter sarcasm, and gifted in the art of the viral clip, Bukele has styled himself as the antithesis of the grey-haired Latin American caudillo. But beneath the filters lies something far older: a carefully crafted machinery of repression that is as brutal as it is innovative.
Since taking office in 2019, Bukele has disbanded checks and balances like they were Black Friday leftovers. Judges? Fired. Opposition? Mocked. Constitution? “More like a suggestion,” he said, running for a second term despite an explicit ban. And yet, his approval ratings hover between 85–90%. To many Salvadorans, the tradeoff—liberty for safety—feels worth it.
Trump, seated beside him last week, grinned like a man who just found a MAGA mirror image in Central America. “One hell of a president,” he called him. Bukele smiled back, grateful for the compliment—and perhaps, the strategic alliance it implied.
The Kafkaesque Pawn: Kilmar Abrego García’s Deportation and the Death of Due Process
This undated photo provided by CASA, an immigrant advocacy organization, in April 2025, shows Kilmar Abrego Garcia. (CASA via AP)
Into this Machiavellian theatre wandered one unfortunate soul: Kilmar Abrego García. A Maryland resident, married to a US citizen, and legally protected from deportation by a 2019 court order, Abrego García was nevertheless scooped up and sent to El Salvador’s CECOT prison—one of the most notorious detention centres on the planet.
The Trump administration now admits it was an “administrative error.” But instead of correcting it, they doubled down. Secretary of State Marco Rubio declared that no American court can conduct foreign policy, and President Trump has indicated zero interest in reversing the deportation. When asked whether he’d facilitate Abrego García’s return, Bukele scoffed: “What do you want me to do, smuggle him into the US?”
The case has now reached Kafkaesque proportions—caught in a purgatory of legal limbo and diplomatic shrugging. Judge Paula Xinis has ordered the administration to “facilitate” his return. The Supreme Court has backed her. And yet, nothing moves. Because in the world of Bukele and Trump, legality is a footnote. Optics are the law.
Prison Diplomacy: Trump’s Bold New Outsourcing Strategy
The most audacious part of the Trump-Bukele bromance? The idea that the US might start deporting not just immigrants, but actual American citizens to El Salvador’s mega-prison. In the same Oval Office meeting, Trump mused openly: “If it’s a homegrown criminal, I have no problem. We’re studying the laws right now.”
Pam Bondi is apparently on the job. The Constitution may disagree, but the Constitution doesn’t trend on Truth Social.
Bukele, meanwhile, has fully leaned into his role as America’s favoured warden. Since January, El Salvador has taken in over 200 deportees, including Venezuelans and others who’ve never set foot in the country. Some have no criminal records. Others are photographed shirtless and tattooed in chains, paraded as gang members for propaganda clips. A top ICE official even conceded many have no criminal charges at all.
“We are helping you out,” Bukele told Trump. “You imprison them to liberate the 350 million.” In Bukele’s version of governance, prisons are not merely a tool—they are the product. And America, it seems, is buying.
Bitcoin Dreams and Crypto Realities: Bukele’s Techno-Authoritarian Fantasy
But Bukele isn’t just a prison czar—he’s also a Bitcoin bro. In 2021, he made El Salvador the first country to declare Bitcoin legal tender, promising financial liberation through the Chivo wallet. What followed was part soap opera, part crypto comedy.
By 2024, less than 20% of the population used the Chivo wallet. A planned “Bitcoin City,” powered by volcanoes and funded through billion-dollar crypto bonds, has fizzled. And the IMF, unimpressed by El Salvador’s leap into digital financial chaos, forced Bukele to scale back the programme and eliminate tax incentives for Bitcoin transactions.
Yet, like Musk hailing Dogecoin during a market crash, Bukele remains undeterred. El Salvador now holds over 6,100 Bitcoin—worth roughly $500 million in today’s market. Whether this proves to be a strategic hedge or a speculative death spiral remains to be seen.
To Trump, however, it’s genius. Bitcoin, prisons, viral videos—it’s government by engagement metric. A presidency run like an algorithm.
The Axis of Authoritarian Cool: A New Playbook for Strongmen
President Donald Trump greets El Salvador’s President Nayib Bukele as he arrives at the West Wing of the White House, Monday, April 14, 2025, in Washington. (AP Photo/Alex Brandon)
Trump and Bukele are not just allies. They are avatars of a new brand of populist authoritarianism: post-ideological, post-constitutional, and deeply, irreversibly online.
They govern through vibes, not laws. Through memes, not manifestos. Trump has Truth Social; Bukele has TikTok. One live-streams Biden jokes and Hunter Biden conspiracies. The other drops montage videos of gang members getting buzzcuts in slow motion. Both speak the language of “fake news,” “witch hunts,” and “so unfair.”
🚨BREAKING: El Salvador President Bukele says he WILL NOT send MS-13 terrorists back to the United States:
“How can I smuggle a terrorist into the United States? Of course I’m not going to do it. The question is preposterous!”
pic.twitter.com/ZALlxtUz0F— Benny Johnson (@bennyjohnson) April 14, 2025
But beneath the performance lies a coherent strategy: dismantle the judiciary, bypass the legislature, centralise power, and sell the results as necessary sacrifice. It’s Hungary with hashtags. Russia with ring lights. Authoritarianism that knows how to thread a meme.
Bukele’s consolidation of power—replacing judges, shrinking the legislature, sidelining prosecutors—has been so seamless, so stylish, that other strongmen are watching. Latin America is already murmuring about the “Bukele Model”—a mix of brutal repression and dazzling public relations. Trump, too, sees a blueprint: this is what governance looks like when you stop pretending courts matter.
What Now? A Dictator with a Visa and a Partner with Nukes
Bukele’s re-election was unconstitutional. He did it anyway. His mass arrests are illegal under international law. He calls them “justice.” His prisons are overcrowded, unsanitary, and deadly—over 400 deaths since the 2022 emergency decree. His approval ratings remain sky-high.
And now, he’s walking the halls of the White House, being courted by the most powerful man in the world.
Senator Chris Van Hollen, whose constituent Abrego García remains locked in CECOT, demanded answers. Democrats called the meeting shameful. But Trump isn’t listening. He’s too busy praising the Salvadoran gulag as a model of efficiency.
Bukele’s rise marks something darker: the legitimisation of techno-authoritarianism in the West’s front yard. It’s not enough that he imprisoned 85,000 people. It’s that he made it look cool. Slick video edits, Apple-style prison unveilings, and Twitter polls to mock his critics.
Musk may still be the world’s richest chaos agent, but Bukele is its most influential autocrat in sneakers. And in Trump’s America, that counts for far more than free speech, due process, or constitutional fidelity.
Postscript: The Man Left Behind
Kilmar Abrego García remains in CECOT. His lawyers describe his situation as “Kafkaesque.” But Kafka would be too hopeful. At least in The Trial, the state pretended to care. Here, both governments are telling us the mistake was known, deliberate, and irreversible.
When law is entertainment and prisons are diplomatic currency, justice becomes impossible. Abrego García isn’t a glitch in the system. He is the system. A man deported by mistake, denied by design, and forgotten by choice.
And that’s exactly how the world’s coolest dictator wants it.
