Trump knew what he was saying, doing

In his column “Donald Trump is right. MS-13 members are ‘animals,’ ” Caleb Howe defended President Trump’s use of the term “animals” by insisting that he was speaking about members of the vicious Mara Salvatrucha gang (MS-13).

As someone who has provided expert testimony in dozens of asylum hearings, I am certainly aware of the gang’s brutality. I have worked with Salvadorans who were targeted by MS-13 or its rival, Barrio 18, because they refused to join the gang, had witnessed a crime, were unable to pay extortion, or would not serve as sexual slaves.

If they had remained in El Salvador, gang members would have almost certainly tortured them, killed them, and left their dismembered bodies in public to terrify others. These Salvadorans could not turn to the authorities because they knew the police would do nothing to protect them and may have actually cooperated with the gangs. That is why El Salvador had a homicide rate of more than 81 per 100,000 residents in 2016.

The Trump administration’s policy of rounding up Central Americans fleeing the gangs and doing everything possible to deny their legal right to seek asylum is therefore unconscionable.

Lawrence M. Ladutke

El Salvador country specialist Amnesty International USA

New York