El Salvador’s presidential election results were predictable given its current political landscape. On February 4, 2024, incumbent Nayib Bukele was reelected with nearly 83 percent of the vote, despite numerous irregularities. The biggest irregularity of all is the fact that, under El Salvador’s constitution, incumbents are not eligible to run for a consecutive term. Yet through a range of smoke and mirrors tactics to quell any potential protest, Bukele did so anyway, flouting democratic norms in favor of strong-arm approaches. The independent Salvadoran outlet El Faro went as far as to proclaim the end of the country’s democracy following Bukele’s dismantling of the judiciary, clearing the way for his candidacy, in 2021.

Bukele’s latest victory has been analyzed by many to be a signal of Salvadorans’ exhaustion with the previous status quo. As I have written elsewhere, after decades of gang domination, voters were willing to accept gross human rights violations and indefinite imprisonment for some Salvadorans in exchange for increased security for the masses. Votes for Bukele confirmed Salvadorans’ willingness to maintain Bukele’s state of exception, a form of emergency rule that has been in place since March 27, 2022. The suspension of many rights under the state of exception has been part of El Salvador’s significant democratic backsliding and rising authoritarianism.

Other antidemocratic moves include fraud in the legislative election and gerrymandering to drastically reduce the number of municipalities in order to consolidate Bukele’s New Ideas party’s power. The biggest concern, however, has been the practice of arbitrary arrest and indefinite detention, which Bukele has heralded as evidence of a strong state breaking the control of El Salvador’s notorious gangs. But the story is more complicated than his government would like people to think.