Marco Rubio heads to Costa Rica and Guatemala after high-stakes El Salvador migration deal

Zander Hawthorne Sep 9 0 Comments

Rubio’s tour aims to lock in migration and security pacts — and check China

Marco Rubio is on a fast-moving swing through Costa Rica and Guatemala with an unusually broad brief: harden migration controls, deepen security cooperation, and push back against China’s growing footprint in the Americas. The trip comes right after he unveiled what he called an unprecedented migration deal with El Salvador’s president, Nayib Bukele — a pact that instantly raised legal, logistical, and political questions in Washington and across the region.

At the heart of Rubio’s push is a simple calculation: if the United States can strike tighter, country-by-country agreements on returns, transit, and enforcement, it can disrupt smuggling routes and speed up removals. Costa Rica and Guatemala sit on key chokepoints in the migration flow north. Costa Rica has become a major transit country for people moving up from South America. Guatemala is a last-mile corridor to Mexico and a gateway for U.S.-bound crossings. Any new framework that adds real capacity — more screening, more removal flights, more data-sharing — changes the equation on the ground.

Washington also wants these talks to double as a security upgrade. Expect discussions on joint operations against human smuggling networks, intelligence exchanges targeting cross-border gangs, and help for local forces that shoulder the daily strain of migration and organized crime. The State Department hinted the agenda will also address technology and infrastructure security — code for concerns about Chinese vendors in telecom, port logistics, and surveillance systems.

That’s the third leg of Rubio’s message: countering Beijing’s influence. China’s state-backed firms have poured loans, equipment, and construction deals into Latin America over the past decade. Costa Rica recognized Beijing in 2007 and has since entertained a range of Chinese commercial projects. Guatemala, by contrast, maintains diplomatic ties with Taiwan and faces pressure from both sides. U.S. officials argue that decisions on 5G networks, port concessions, and critical infrastructure financing carry national security risks that last decades.

What might the U.S. seek in Costa Rica and Guatemala? Officials haven’t published a checklist, but the contours are clear:

• Faster repatriation pipelines — including charter flights and ground transfers — for nationals and, in some cases, for third-country migrants.
• Transit management measures to reduce uncontrolled movement, paired with screening for asylum, trafficking, and security risks.
• Joint targeting of smuggling organizations, with better real-time data and vetted units to act on it.
• Technology and infrastructure safeguards that limit exposure to high-risk foreign vendors, plus U.S.-backed financing alternatives.

El Salvador’s offer to hold foreign deportees — and U.S. convicts — resets the debate

Rubio’s biggest headline so far came in San Salvador. After meeting Bukele, he touted a sweeping arrangement under which El Salvador would accept deportees from the United States regardless of nationality — a major departure from standard repatriation rules that send people back to their countries of origin. Bukele also floated a striking add-on: for a fee, El Salvador would hold people convicted in U.S. courts, even if they are U.S. citizens or lawful residents, inside the country’s giant Terrorism Confinement Center, known as CECOT.

That proposal jolted legal experts for a simple reason: under U.S. law, citizens cannot be deported. Outsourcing incarceration to a foreign government would be a different mechanism entirely — and one that would collide with constitutional protections, federal statutes, and oversight norms. Any such scheme would almost certainly require new legislation, formal agreements, court-tested due process safeguards, and a monitoring regime that satisfies U.S. judges. Lawsuits would arrive on day one.

Bukele framed the idea as a cost-saving service. He argued that U.S. payments could make El Salvador’s prison system financially self-sustaining. CECOT, opened in 2023, is one of the world’s largest prisons and was built during Bukele’s crackdown on gangs. The government credits the campaign with a steep drop in murders. Human rights groups, however, have documented mass arrests, due process concerns, and harsh conditions, and they warn that megafacilities concentrate power with limited transparency. Those competing narratives will shadow any talks about transferring inmates across borders.

Even without the prison outsourcing piece, the promise to accept deportees of any nationality would be a big shift. It could speed up removals for people who cannot be returned quickly to their home countries — a recurring bottleneck in the U.S. system. But the details matter: which categories of migrants would be covered, how long they could be held or resettled, what legal status they would have in El Salvador, and how costs and responsibilities would be divided. Without clear answers, implementation risks outpacing the law.

Costa Rica and Guatemala will weigh these questions with their own political and legal constraints. Both face domestic pressures over migration, public security, and budgets. Costa Rica has grappled with large flows of people crossing from Panama, straining shelters and local services. Guatemala sits between powerful smuggling corridors and must cooperate closely with Mexico. Any new accords will need to show tangible benefits at home — aid for communities, training for security forces, investments in border infrastructure — not just enforcement demands from Washington.

There’s also the China angle. In Costa Rica, the U.S. is likely to press for tighter rules on high-risk tech vendors and greater scrutiny of port and logistics projects. In Guatemala, maintaining ties with Taiwan adds a different layer: the U.S. may offer economic and security sweeteners to reinforce that stance while warning about the strategic costs of switching recognition to Beijing. Expect language about supply chain resilience, cyber security, and avoiding hidden debt traps in infrastructure loans.

All of this is unfolding against the reality that migration routes through the Americas have professionalized. Smuggling networks now market package deals that move people country to country, often through the Darién Gap and up through Central America. Blocking one segment only works if the others hold too. That is why Washington is trying to stitch together interoperable policies — shared data, common screening standards, and synchronized enforcement — from Panama to Mexico.

Back in the U.S., Rubio’s El Salvador announcement triggered a predictable split. Supporters see a bold attempt to clear legal logjams and cut costs by leveraging regional partners. Critics warn it invites abuse and offshores accountability. The constitutional barriers to transferring U.S. citizens into foreign prisons are high, and even for noncitizens, U.S. courts would demand credible oversight of detention conditions and access to counsel. Budget hawks will also ask whether the math works once transport, monitoring, and legal compliance are factored in.

So what would count as success for this trip? Watch for specific, verifiable deliverables rather than sweeping rhetoric. That could mean new removal flights on a set schedule; a joint task force with named units and a published mandate; a data-sharing protocol with privacy and due process guardrails; or a framework on high-risk vendors with clear procurement rules. If Rubio emerges from Costa Rica and Guatemala with concrete steps like these — and a pathway to scale them — the tour could mark a real shift in how the U.S. manages migration and security partnerships in Central America.

The bigger question is whether the El Salvador model becomes a template or an outlier. If it’s the former, expect intense legal battles and a new phase of regional bargaining over who houses whom, under what laws, and at what price. If it’s the latter, the tour may still yield a more traditional slate of agreements that tighten transit, speed returns, and raise the bar on infrastructure security without crossing into untested territory like overseas incarceration.