The Prison No One Leaves - Cry for the Forgotten Men of CECOT

There’s a prison in El Salvador where no one leaves. It's called the Terrorism Confinement Center—CECOT—and it’s been described as a mega-prison. A fortress. But to me, it feels more like a graveyard for the living.

Hundreds—maybe thousands—of men have been sent there from the United States. Some with tattoos, some with past mistakes, but many with nothing more than a name or a zip code that placed them under suspicion. Some, like Kilmar Abrego Garcia, were fathers, workers, people with homes and lives here in America. Men with no criminal record. Men who believed they had rights. Men who thought America still stood for justice.

Instead, they were handcuffed, put on planes, and handed over to a government whose own justice system is crumbling under authoritarian weight. Now they sit in cages, often without charges, trials, or legal representation. The government of El Salvador has been clear—these men “will never return to their communities.” They don’t even pretend this is about rehabilitation. This is punishment without end.

I can't stop thinking about them. What they must feel in the silence of that prison. No voices calling their names. No lawyers knocking on the door. No visits. No light.

And it haunts me because this didn’t happen in secret. It happened with press releases. With applause. With indifference.

We’re told it’s for safety. That it's about gangs. But that’s not how justice works. We don’t punish people without proof. We don’t deport U.S. residents without hearings. We don’t disappear people to other countries just because it’s politically convenient.

Or at least… we shouldn’t.

This isn’t just about immigration or crime or politics. This is about our collective conscience. About whether we believe in second chances, or even first chances. About whether we believe every human being deserves due process—or whether we’re okay throwing away lives just to look tough.

I’m speaking out because silence is complicity. I may not be in government. I may not have a national platform. But I have a voice—and I’m using it for the men who were silenced.

Bring Kilmar home. Investigate every deportation. Shine a light inside CECOT. And for the love of justice—stop pretending that cruelty is strength.