Piercing the Propaganda Bubble in El Salvador

WOLA presents a new episode about El Salvador, coinciding with our awarding of our 2025 Human Rights Award to MOVIR, El Salvador's Movement of Victims of the Regime, which supports victims and families of arbitrary detentions carried out by President Nayib Bukele's government. In this conversation, Ricardo Valencia, assistant professor of public relations in the Department of Communications at California State University, Fullerton, explains why the current popularity of El Salvador's authoritarian president rests on a surprisingly fragile foundation. Dr. Valencia, a former journalist in El Salvador and an expert on political and activist communications, explains that Bukele is facing several challenges to his rule that even a slick propaganda operation cannot paper over. These include a lackluster economy, mainstream voters' discomfort with the regime's celebrations of cruelty and imprisonment, Bukele's relations with just one political party in the United States, the loss of emigration as an "escape valve" and a likely increase in deportations, and discontent with corruption. While Dr. Valencia doesn't foresee Bukele's downfall as imminent—he is very popular because of security gains and effective communications—the Salvadoran leader, he argues, is planting the seeds for a sharp drop in popularity. In the meantime, Valencia calls for constant, energetic accompaniment and defense of El Salvador's beleaguered civil society, independent media, and others fighting for democratic institutions and rights.