“The war in Vietnam is but a symptom of a far deeper malady within the American spirit, and if we ignore this sobering reality…and if we ignore this sobering reality, we will find ourselves organizing “clergy and laymen concerned” committees for the next generation. They will be concerned about Guatemala — Guatemala and Peru. They will be concerned about Thailand and Cambodia. They will be concerned about Mozambique and South Africa. We will be marching for these and a dozen other names and attending rallies without end, unless there is a significant and profound change in American life and policy.” — Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., “Beyond Vietnam,” April 4,1967
As spring 2026 opens, we are approaching the anniversaries of two fateful events: the illegal deportation of Kilmer Abrego Garcia, a refugee from El Salvador, because of what the Trump Administration termed an “administrative error” on March 18, 2025; and the assassination of Archbishop Oscar Romero in San Salvador while saying mass on March 24, 1980. Both events highlight the prophecy quoted above of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. and the threat of false narratives from white Christian nationalism: Archbishop Romero, now Saint Oscar Romero after his canonization under Pope Francis, represents a Gospel alternative, for which he, like the Rev. Dr. King, gave his life.
On April 4, 1968, precisely a year after his courageous and prophetic sermon “Beyond Vietnam,” Rev. Dr. King was assassinated while supporting garbage strikers in Memphis. Also in 1968, the Poor People’s Campaign, which he had called for during the last months of his life, made itself felt in the Resurrection City camp in our nation’s capital. And a group of Latin American Catholic bishops conferred in Medellin, Columbia and declared “the preferential option for the poor” as indeed not only an option or choice, but the divine mandate.
Justice had remarkably triumphed in El Salvador in May of 1944, when the dictator Maximiliano Hernandez Martinez was overthrown by a nonviolent revolution including a general strike and economic shutdown after a military coup to oust him had failed in April. Unfortunately, this revolution did not end the power of las catorce familias, “the fourteen families,” who were in the position of a kind of oligarchy. The dictator Martinez in 1932 had suppressed a peasant revolt with many Indigenous people involved; the carnage, known as la matanza_(“the slaughter”) did not discourage the USA from supporting him.
By 1979, the situation in El Salvador had degenerated to civil war, with a junta and its death squads targeting members of the clergy as well as peasants and political activists. Archbishop Romero saw many of his own colleagues murdered (for example Father Rutilio Grandi, SJ, earlier killed by Salvadoran security forces in 1977), but resolved to defend the poor and the Gospel, with the knowledge that he might well meet the same fate. Two of his acts stand out. He wrote a letter to President James Earl Carter of the USA on February 17, 1980 warning President Carter not to give military aid to the junta if he wished to promote “human rights.” And on March 23, 1980, he appealed for the soldiers of his country to disobey orders to kill civilians, urging that the divine law must be followed rather than such immoral orders. He was shot down at the altar the next day.
As the Rev. Dr. King had prophesied, there were many marches and many committees organized in the 1980s against U.S. foreign policy in El Salvador and elsewhere in Central America. In Sacramento, the Central America Action Committee (CAAC) was an example. An estimated 75,000-80,000 civilians were killed by death squads aligned with the U.S.-supported government. Eventually, a peace was negotiated in 1992, but the ravages of civil war left a fertile soil for continued death squad activity and the growth of gangs. It was from this milieu of gang violence that Kilmar Abrego Garcia became a refugee, being granted asylum in 2019 and cooperating with the immigration authorities.
As was revealed when Garcia was deported to El Salvador, government human rights violations have not yet ended there. President Nayib Bukele, a cordial ally of the Trump Administration, ran a facility where Garcia was confined for a time, the Center for the Confinement of Terrorism (CECOT), where forms of torture such as beating prisoners or shooting them with rubber bullets are reportedly common, and there are allegations of disappearances among prisoners.
Kilmar Abrego Garcia was eventually returned to the USA, but faces continued harassment from the Trump Administration in the form of prosecution for apparently baseless charges. The courts must determine if this is a vindictive prosecution.
Rev. Dr. King, Archbishop Oscar Romero, and nonviolent liberation theology
The courageous witness of Archbishop Oscar Romero for “the preferential option for the poor” at once fulfills and is clarifed by the Rev. Dr. King’s sermon on “Beyond Vietnam.” As Dr. King forcibly argued, it is impossible to tell “desperate, angry, and rejected young men” that guns and Molotov cocktails cannot solve their problems while remaining silent about one’s government’s use of guns and bombs to solve problems and taking the role of “the greatest purveyor of violence in the world.” These are not words to be watered down or dumbed down, and today the Poor People’s Campaign is the nonviolent army of the poor committed to a single standard of peace and justice.
Resisting Racist Backlash and Imperialist “Monroe/Donroe Doctrines”
Today racist backlash is being directed at People of Color generally, and immigrants who are People of Color in particular. Thus the invasions of Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) into our communities in places such as Los Angeles, Chicago, and Minneapolis; and also the Trump Administration’s military invasion of Venezuela, and “boat strikes” indiscriminately killing innocent civilian passengers and crew members attempting to surrender in the Caribbean. The latter seems more like maritime death squad activity or state-sponsored terrorism than any kind of warfare under international treaties and law, as horrible as all war is.
The spreading of false rumors against Haitian refugees to incite racial hatred in Springfield, Ohio, is unusual in recent times, recalling the false rumors which helped set off the Tulsa Race Massacre of 1921. But the invasion of Venezuela recalled military interventions of the USA in Guatemala (1954), the Dominican Republic (1965), not to mention Nicaragua in the 1980’s and the USA’s enthusiastic support in El Salvador for the junta allied with the death squads that assassinated Archbishop Romero.
Thus a true program of liberation must include freeing ourselves from an imperialist foreign policy that oppresses our entire hemisphere. This was the message of the Rev. Dr. King and it is a message driven home, along with his prophetic words, by the example of Saint Oscar Romero.
Protected by CC BY 4.0
Tribuno del Pueblo brings you articles written by individuals or organizations, along with our own reporting. Bylined articles reflect the views of the authors. Unsigned articles reflect the views of the editorial board. Please credit the source when sharing: tribunodelpueblo.org. We’re all volunteers, no paid staff. Please donate at http://tribunodelpueblo.org to keep bringing you the voices of the movement because no human being is illegal.
