El Salvador's Bukele Claims Big Election Victory

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Facts

  • Salvadoran Pres. Nayib Bukele announced that he has been reelected for a second term on Sunday, claiming to have gained more than 85% of the popular vote — reputedly the largest percentage in history — with his New Ideas party winning at least 58 out of the National Assembly's 60 seats.1
  • According to preliminary results from the country's Supreme Electoral Tribunal released on Monday morning after 70% of the ballots had been counted, Bukele led with 83% of the vote while his closest rival, the left-wing Farabundo Martí National Liberation Front, reached only 7%.2
  • If confirmed, Bukele will become the first two-term leader in the country since the end of the civil war in 1992, as the Supreme Court allowed him to circumvent a constitutional ban on consecutive terms and run for re-election.3
  • This landslide win for the incumbent shows popular support for at least some of his controversial policies, particularly the state of exception introduced in March 2022 to crack down on gangs. Human rights organizations claim this has led to the unlawful arrest of thousands of innocent people.4
  • Security authorities claimed in January that the homicide rate in El Salvador dropped roughly 70% in 2023, from 495 to 154 — allegedly the lowest rate in the Americas apart from Canada, 2.4 per every 100K people — as a result of the emergency measures in effect since 2022.5
  • More than 75K people — over 1% of the country's population — have been arrested as suspected gang members under the state of emergency, with 7K being later released. El Salvador had one of the world's highest murder rates at 38 per every 100K people when Bukele took power in 2019.6

Sources: 1Breitbart, 2Associated Press, 3MercoPress, 4BBC News, 5Reuters and 6Barrons.

Narratives

  • Pro-establishment narrative, as provided by Americas Quarterly. The decline of the democratic multi-party system in El Salvador is a matter of fact now, as the Latin American country is once again under a de facto one-party dictatorship that has co-opted state institutions. While Bukele may have recorded a supermajority due to an improvement in security, this nearly unanimous support may wane if his government fails to address the country's dire economic and social conditions.
  • Establishment-critical narrative, as provided by El Salvador in English. The result for Bukele is an incredible moment — a record-breaking show of support for a leader within the history of global democracy. After an unprecedented popular mandate, El Salvador continues to stand behind the man who has transformed the country for the better and will no doubt continue to lead the nation forward.