GNN has reported several times since the end of 2023 about falling violent crime rates across American cities. But the latest homicide statistics coming out of neighboring El Salvador are truly something to celebrate.
Put simply, the Bukele Administration has turned the country from the most murderous in Latin America to the safest, across a single 5-year term.
With a rate of 1.9 per 100,000 inhabitants and a total homicide count of 119 during 2024, El Salvador is safer than many major cities in America.
It represents a 98% drop over 9 years.
President Nayib Bukele took power in 2019 and has enjoyed the backing of a friendly legislature and supreme court that has granted him extraordinary executive powers to combat paramilitary-like street gangs that controlled parts of the country.
Since 2022, the country has been under a state of emergency, during which time 83,000 arrests were made, and national policing forces took the fight to the gangs. Constitutional rights were suspended in some cases, and many were charged and imprisoned without due process of law, something the administration has been criticized for.
It’s difficult to argue with the results, however, since in 2015, El Salvador witnessed 6,656 homicides, placing it among war zones as one of the most dangerous countries on the planet.
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Residents of the capital San Salvador told AP News that they can safely walk the streets again, where before the gangs controlled the movement of people in and out of neighborhoods.
Riding an enormous wave of popularity, Bukele won his February 2024 reelection campaign at a canter.
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