President Donald Trump and two of his key cabinet chiefs addressed the growing problem of the violent transnational MS-13 gang on April 18, with Attorney General Jeff Sessions even saying the gang could qualify as a terrorist organization.
Homeland Security Secretary John Kelly called MS-13 one of the greatest hazards the nation faces.
And Trump sent out a tweet: “The weak illegal immigration policies of the Obama Admin. allowed bad MS 13 gangs to form in cities across U.S. We are removing them fast!”
The MS-13, or Mara Salvatrucha, gang was formed in Los Angeles in the 1980s by mostly-illegal immigrants who were escaping the civil war in El Salvador.
It is now one of the largest criminal organizations in the country, with 6,000 to 10,000 members in at least 42 states, according to FBI estimates. In addition, more than 60,000 members operate internationally, mostly in El Salvador, Honduras, and Guatemala.
Robert Capers, former U.S. attorney for the Eastern District of New York, said MS-13 gets gang members to illegally enter the United States from Central America and recruits new members from schools and communities around the country.
In 2004, the FBI created the MS-13 National Gang Task Force.
Lax immigration enforcement policies have allowed the gang to proliferate throughout the United States, often in lockstep with large numbers of unaccompanied minors from Central America being placed in communities by the Office of Refugee Resettlement.
In the last 3 1/2 years, around 30,000 of these young people have been placed in just four counties in the United States—Harris County in Texas, Los Angeles County, Suffolk County in New York, and Miami-Dade County in Florida.
