Episode Details

Below is the full CECOT Interview from CBS Canada courtesy of Timothy Burke.

I’ve watched it. It is devastating. Every person should watch and know how their tax dollars are being spent to torture and sexually abuse people. Let’s Address This.

FULL TRANSCRIPT

CBS News / 60 Minutes — Transcript: CECOT Deportations and Detention

You may recall earlier this year when the Trump administration deported hundreds of Venezuelan men to El Salvador, a country most had no connection to. The White House claimed the men were terrorists, part of a violent gang, and invoked a centuries-old wartime power, saying it allowed them to deport some men immediately without due process—an unusual strategy that sparked an ongoing legal battle.

Tonight, you’ll hear from some of those men. They describe torture, sexual and physical abuse inside CECOT, one of El Salvador’s harshest prisons, where they say they endured four months of hell.

It began as soon as the planes landed. The deportees thought they were headed back to Venezuela, but then saw hundreds of Salvadoran police waiting for them on the tarmac. Shackled, they were paraded in front of cameras, pushed onto buses, and delivered to CECOT, El Salvador’s notorious maximum-security prison.

“When we got there, the CECOT director was talking to us. The first thing he told us was that we would never see the light of day or night again. He said, ‘Welcome to hell. I’ll make sure you never leave.’”

“Did you think you were going to die there?”

“We thought we were already the living dead. Honestly.”

We met Luis Muñoz Pinto in Colombia. He was a college student in repressive Venezuela and hoped to seek asylum in the United States in 2024. He says he waited in Mexico until his scheduled appointment with U.S. Customs and Border Protection in California.

“During that interview, they just looked at me and told me I was a danger to society.”

“You have no criminal record?”

“Nothing. I never even got a traffic ticket.”

Nevertheless, he was detained by Customs. He says he spent six months locked up in the U.S. waiting for a decision on his asylum case—then he was deported.

He was one of 252 Venezuelans sent to CECOT between March and April. Inside, he says their hands and feet were tied, they were forced to their knees, and their heads were shaved.

“There was blood everywhere, screams, people crying, people who couldn’t take it and were urinating and vomiting on themselves. When you get there, you already know you’re in hell. You don’t need anyone else to tell you.”

He says the guards began savagely beating them with their fists and batons.

“Tell me about what they did to you personally.”

“Four guards grabbed me and they beat me until I bled to the point of agony. They knocked our faces against the wall. That was when they broke one of my teeth.”

CECOT—the Terrorism Confinement Center—was built in 2022 as a key part of El Salvador President Nayib Bukele’s sweeping anti-gang crackdown. The massive prison, designed to hold 40,000 inmates, and its harsh reputation are a point of pride for Bukele, who regularly allows social media influencers to tour it.

“As you can see, we’re literally in the middle of the desert.”

Guards show off crammed cells where metal bunks are stacked four high. There are no mattresses or sheets. Inmates say they had no access to the outdoors and no contact with relatives.

International observers warned CECOT was violating the U.N. standard for minimum treatment of prisoners. Two years ago, during the Biden administration, the U.S. State Department cited torture and life-threatening prison conditions in its report on El Salvador.

But this year, during a meeting with President Bukele at the White House, President Trump expressed admiration for El Sa