CECOT is owned by the Republic of El Salvador. The Centro de Confinamiento del Terrorismo is a state asset of the national government, built on President Nayib Bukele’s orders in 2022 and opened about a year later in Tecoluca, roughly 72 kilometers east of San Salvador. There is no private operator, no foreign co-owner, and no public-private partnership. The land, the buildings, and the infrastructure all belong to the Salvadoran state, and the executive branch keeps direct authority over the site.
That distinction matters. Private prisons are common elsewhere, and the question of who profits from incarceration shapes how a facility is run. At CECOT, no private operator is extracting fees. The Salvadoran government carries the full cost and holds full operational control, which is both the stated intent of the Bukele administration and the basis for most of the international criticism the prison has drawn.
Which Government Bodies Run the Facility
Three state bodies share day-to-day responsibility. The Ministry of Justice and Public Security holds overarching authority. Inside that ministry, the Directorate General of Penal Centers handles inmate logistics and internal administration. The Armed Forces and the National Civil Police provide the security presence on the ground.1Global Detention Project. Centro de Confinamiento del Terrorismo (CECOT)
The military role is worth emphasizing. CECOT is not a civilian corrections facility staffed by career prison guards. Armed soldiers control the perimeter and the internal checkpoints, and the overall security posture resembles a military installation more than a traditional prison. That blending of military and correctional functions is a defining feature of how the state runs the site.
How CECOT Was Built and Paid For
Construction was authorized through legislation passed by El Salvador’s Legislative Assembly, which gave the executive branch power to acquire land and fast-track new penitentiary centers, bypassing the usual procurement timelines. Funding comes entirely from the national budget, with the Ministry of Finance directing taxpayer revenue toward construction, staffing, utilities, and ongoing maintenance. No private investors hold a financial stake.
The full cost of building the prison has not been transparently disclosed. Publicly available Ministry of Finance records show that a Mexican contractor, Contratista General de América Latina, received a contract worth approximately $23.9 million for its portion of the work. The total almost certainly exceeds that figure, since the contract covered only one phase, but the government has not published a comprehensive accounting.
Reported capacity is 40,000 inmates, placing CECOT among the largest single prison complexes in the world.2U.S. Department of State. 2023 Country Reports on Human Rights Practices: El Salvador The site is remote by design, isolated from population centers.
The Legal Basis for State Control
CECOT operates inside the broader legal environment created by El Salvador’s state of exception, declared through Legislative Decree No. 333 on March 27, 2022. The decree suspended several constitutional protections, including freedom of association and assembly, the presumption of innocence, and standard due-process rights for criminal defendants. As of late 2024, the state of exception had been renewed more than 24 times, and it remains in effect in 2026. Roughly 85,000 people have been imprisoned since March 2022 under those emergency powers, far exceeding CECOT’s capacity alone.
The suspended protections are what allow the government to hold inmates at CECOT under conditions that would otherwise face immediate challenge in Salvadoran courts. Detainees have been held for extended periods without formal charges, without access to lawyers, and without family contact. The legal mechanism behind that regime is the state of exception, not ordinary criminal law.
What the U.S. Deportation Deal Changed
CECOT entered the American political conversation in early 2025, when the Trump administration reached a deal with President Bukele to house foreign deportees at the facility. The United States paid El Salvador $6 million to detain more than 250 alleged members of the Venezuelan gang Tren de Aragua, along with 23 suspected MS-13 members and leaders. The deportees were flown to El Salvador in March 2025. Secretary of State Marco Rubio publicly endorsed the arrangement, describing it as holding accused gang members in “very good jails at a fair price” that would save American taxpayer money.
The deal did not transfer ownership of anything. El Salvador retains full control of the facility and of the detainees inside it. The U.S. payment is a fee for service, not an investment or an operational stake. Whether additional transfers will follow is unclear, but the precedent is on the books.
Why Ownership Matters
International organizations have documented serious problems across El Salvador’s prison system since the state of exception began, and CECOT sits at the center of that scrutiny. The U.S. State Department’s 2023 country report on El Salvador described credible reports of unlawful killings, enforced disappearances, torture, and harsh prison conditions throughout the detention system, including dozens of detainee deaths attributed to beatings, lack of medical care, and untreated chronic illnesses.2U.S. Department of State. 2023 Country Reports on Human Rights Practices: El Salvador The Inter-American Commission on Human Rights has called on El Salvador to end prolonged incommunicado detention and guarantee regular family visits in all penal facilities.3Organization of American States. IACHR Precautionary Measures Resolution 82-25
The Bukele government frames these conditions as the necessary cost of dismantling gangs that terrorized Salvadoran communities for decades, and domestic approval of the crackdown has remained high. The ownership question carries weight because ownership means accountability. The Salvadoran state built CECOT, wrote the laws that govern it, staffs it with soldiers, and has suspended the constitutional rights of the people held inside. There is no third party to assign responsibility to. The government has claimed that responsibility in full.