Speaking to CNN on Sunday, Special Envoy for Hostage Response Adam Boehler spoke about the Trump administration agreeing to a prisoner swap with Venezuela.
00:00You know, they weren't treated so great for the most part. Some were in different cells, but they were sometimes beaten, sometimes deprived of basic food.
00:11Before they came out, they put them in shackles, they shaved their heads, and left them in prison uniforms.
00:18Now, we knew they would come out like that, so we were able and ready, when we picked them up in the bus, to have USA hats, USA t-shirts, and change them so they looked strong.
00:31It was months in the works, and there were a lot of very focused people doing it.
00:35We've got a great, unbelievable team in terms of people on the ground, career people that folks don't ever hear of, and they were driving this bus really hard back and forth.
00:45The reality here is, Bukele had, who's been great, Bukele had a number of people there at CICOT.
00:55He made a deal with Venezuela, and then Venezuela released all Americans.
00:59And so our portion of that deal was to make sure that all of our boys got home.
01:03Well, what it shows is that the president has been very clear.
01:06Bringing Americans home is a critical priority.
01:10We don't accept when other countries take people.
01:12Now, Bukele, President Bukele, has been a good friend, a friend enough to know what's important to the United States.
01:18And so we appreciate the fact that he cleared a deal with Venezuela to release these Americans that came home.
01:24And I will tell you, once they're in our buses, their faces are totally different.
01:29They come in downtrodden, surprised, not knowing what's happened, because these guys don't tell them.
01:35They pull them up in the middle of the night.
01:37They have no idea they're going anywhere.
01:39And then they get into American hands, and the picture changes dramatically.
01:43I'll tell you something.
01:44There's nothing like seeing their faces when they come in.
01:48Venezuela has people from other countries.
01:51We'll work closely with our allies to get them back.
01:53I will tell you right now, we're working hard.
01:55We've got people in Iran, Afghanistan, Russia, and some other places, random places in the world.
02:02And I think it's high time that every country realize, if you're holding an American, it's a real problem.
02:10We have not been going out.
02:11We have not been giving hundreds of millions of dollars.
02:13The way to get in America's good graces and to have discussions is to release those hostages unilaterally and then begin discussions, because we do appreciate that.
02:24So I would say, Jake, we've got to get them all home.
02:26And the other thing is, I need to make sure that Americans are not taken again.
02:30I want people proud to be an American, knowing the American government, via Trump, is going after you, if they take you, and it's going to go well.
