Donald Trump's allies are scratching their heads over the president considering sending Americans convicted of violent crimes to the notorious El Salvadorian prison currently holding migrants deported from the U.S.
Trump, meeting with El Salvador's President Nayib Bukele in the Oval Office on Monday, said that Attorney General Pam Bondi is 'studying the law' on the matter.
But Bondi, when questioned by Fox News on Monday night, refused to answer whether or not deporting Americans to another country for incarceration is legal.
'These are Americans he is saying who have committed the most heinous crimes in our country,' she said. 'Crime is going to decrease dramatically because he has given us a directive to make America safe again.'
And the immigration law that gives the government the authority to deport people does not apply to U.S. citizens. The law could be changed, however.
President Donald Trump is considering sending Americans convicted of violent crimes to overseas prisons
White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt said the administration was examining the issue.
'It's a legal question that the president is looking into,' she said in her briefing on Tuesday. 'He would only consider this if legal, for Americans who are the most violent, egregious repeat offenders of crime, who nobody in this room wants living in their communities.'
As for the legality, Leavitt said: 'When I have more for you to share, I certainly will.'
But legal experts say it's a no go.
'It is pretty obviously illegal and unconstitutional,' Ilya Somin, a professor at George Mason University's Antonin Scalia Law School, told NBC News.
Also, in the U.S, prisoners still have basic constitutional rights and can challenge their convictions and conditions of confinement. It is unclear what rights they would have - if any - in a foreign prison.
The White House argues the people sent to El Salvador are violent gang members. They're being held in the notorious megaprison CECOT, or Center for the Compulsory Housing of Terrorism, in Tecoluca, San Vicente, El Salvador.
The prison is heavily overcrowded and faces allegations of human rights abuse.
The U.S. is paying El Salvador about $6 million per year to jail about 240 Venezuelans and a handful of Salvadorans.
But there is also controversy shrouding that decision.
Some legal experts say the Venezuelans being held at CECOT are there illegally.
They were deported under the Alien Enemies Act, which applies only when the U.S. is officially at war with a foreign government.
Trump declared the Venezuelan Tren de Aragua gang a terrorist threat and then used that to deport illegals he said were members of that gang.
But last month a federal judge temporarily blocked the deportations based on the fact that U.S. wasn’t actually at war.
Attorney General Pam Bondi is researching the legality of sending Americans to prison overseas at the request of the president
White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt: 'It's a legal question that the president is looking into'
Inmates remain in their cell at the Centre for Terrorism Confinement (CECOT)
In the meantime, Trump said he's open to sending more criminals there, including ones that are American citizens.
'I'm all for it,' he said Monday.
'We always have to obey the laws, but we also have homegrown criminals that push people into subways, that hit elderly ladies on the back of the head with a baseball bat when they're not looking, that are absolute monsters,' Trump said. 'I'd like to include them.'
'If it's a homegrown criminal, I have no problem, no,' he said, adding: 'I'm talking about really bad people.'
He also floated the idea with Bukele.
El Salvadoran television captured Trump giving Bukele a tour of the Oval Office before their formal meeting on Monday. The president was heard asking him to build five more prisons.
'Home-growns are next. The home-growns. You gotta build about five more places. It's not big enough,' Trump said.
