Current laws “would categorically preclude most U.S. citizens and residents from serving their sentence in El Salvador,” a former U.S. attorney said.

Under U.S. immigration law, a country such as El Salvador can accept someone deported from the U.S. who isn’t a citizen of that country if the person’s homeland refuses to accept them, says Theresa Cardinal Brown, a former homeland security official under the administrations of Presidents George W. Bush and Barack Obama.