It was the first bilateral meeting between the two men since Mr. Bukele took office in June.



Mr. Bukele, a businessman and former mayor of the capital city, San Salvador, has tried to reposition El Salvador in the eyes of the American administration since his election in February. He has disavowed his predecessors’ embrace of socialist strongmen in the region, he has earnestly tried to sell El Salvador as a friendly place for American investment and he has sought to distance his nation from Guatemala and Honduras, two troubled neighbors with which El Salvador is often lumped.

More than anything, he has been openly solicitous of Mr. Trump’s attention and has refrained from criticizing the American administration, analysts said.

Ana Quintana, a senior policy analyst at the Heritage Foundation, a conservative think tank in Washington, said that during the previous two presidential administrations in El Salvador, “The partnership was really not there at the highest levels, things were quite tense. And he’s really shifted that, and the United States has reciprocated.”

The Bukele administration said the presidents discussed migration, security and investment opportunities in El Salvador, including the development of the tourism sector. They also talked about the fate of Salvadorans who have been living in the United States under the terms of a humanitarian program known as Temporary Protected Status, or T.P.S.

Last Friday, their administrations signed an agreement that would allow the United States to send back asylum-seekers who had crossed El Salvador on their journey to the American border. The Trump administration, as part of its campaign to curb illegal migration and reduce pressure on the American asylum system, has been pushing Latin American countries to sign such pacts.

The government of Honduras was the latest to do so, signing a similar agreement on Wednesday that would require migrants to apply for and be denied protections in that Central American country before being able to petition for asylum in the United States, according to a senior Homeland Security official.

The deal with Honduras comes just days before the brother of President Juan Orlando Hernández of Honduras is set to stand trial on federal drug trafficking charges in Manhattan. The trial threatens to ensnare the Honduran president in a broadening federal investigation into the ties between drug traffickers and Honduran government officials.