White House Ramps Up Defense Of Abrego Garcia’s Deportation

The White House is aggressively building a case against the native Salvadoran the U.S. illegally deported last month as part of a messaging effort designed to combat an onslaught of criticism from Democrats and intensifying scrutiny from the courts.

Kilmar Abrego Garcia’s deportation has quickly become a symbol of the administration’s aggressive immigration agenda, as President Donald Trump looks to fulfill his vow to swiftly deport massive numbers of people who entered the country illegally.

The crux of Trump’s political argument is that the high-profile deportees are hardened criminals. But Abrego Garcia has never been charged with any crime, and federal judges have slammed the Trump administration’s conduct as “shocking” as well as described its claims about him as extraordinarily flimsy.

“We were inundated by millions of people, many millions during the Biden administration,” Trump said Thursday, when asked about the Abrego Garcia case. “A big percentage of those are criminals, serious criminals … Many of those people murdered more than one person, and they’re on the loose. I was elected to get rid of those criminals.”

A federal judge has ordered the administration to “facilitate” Abrego Garcia’s return to the United States after it admitted that his deportation to a Salvadoran prison was an “administrative error.” The Supreme Court upheld that order last week and noted that the deportation was “illegal” because a judge found he had a credible fear of persecution by a local gang there.

Trump’s aides have argued this week that they are in no position to bring Abrego Garcia back to the United States, calling him an MS-13 gang member and “terrorist.” They placed the onus on El Salvador President Nayib Bukele to remove him from the country’s notorious high-security prison.

The departments of Homeland Security and Justice have released several documents in recent days, alleging Abrego Garcia, who was residing in Maryland until his deportation, has a criminal past. And the administration has put a spotlight on the unrelated case of a Maryland mother who was raped and killed by an undocumented immigrant from El Salvador, in an effort to tie Abrego Garcia’s case to Trump’s broader pledge to deport criminal migrants.

The judge who ordered Abrego Garcia’s return, U.S. District Judge Paula Xinis, wrote in an April 6 opinion that the Justice Department had “offered no evidence linking Abrego Garcia to MS-13 or to any terrorist activity.”

The judge noted that, six years ago, immigration authorities had accused him of gang affiliation based solely on “a vague, uncorroborated allegation from a confidential informant” and the fact that he was wearing Chicago Bulls attire.

That hasn’t stopped the White House from escalating its rhetoric.

“MS-13 rapes innocent girls and women, runs sex trafficking operations, murders for sport and terrorizes law abiding people, but that is not enough,” White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt said during a press briefing on Wednesday. “All of that is not enough to stop the Democrat party from their lies. The No. 1 issue they are focused on right now is bringing back this illegal alien terrorist to America.”

Even if Abrego Garcia is the dangerous criminal the White House paints him as, his deportation to El Salvador last month still would have been illegal, because the 2019 immigration-court order remained in effect. The Trump administration could have sought to lift that order by submitting evidence of purported terrorist activities, but it did not do so.

Criticism about Abrego Garcia’s deportation reached a fever pitch this week, reigniting a partisan divide over immigration that so far this year has simmered below the surface. And the debate exposes the political challenges the administration will face as it quarrels with judges and expands the group of immigrants it has targeted for deportation.

Democrats — who have largely remained silent on the issue since Trump returned to office — have intensified their outcry, as Sen. Chris Van Hollen (D-Md.) flew to El Salvador this week to try and secure the man’s release. He met with Abrego Garcia Thursday evening, after telling reporters earlier in the day that he was turned away from El Salvador’s Terrorism Confinement Center by Salvadoran soldiers who had been “ordered not to allow us to proceed.” Van Hollen posted a photo of himself and Abrego Garcia sitting at a table Thursday night.

Bukele shared additional photos of them, quipping that Abrego Garcia had “miraculously risen from the 'death camps' & 'torture,' now sipping margaritas with Sen. Van Hollen in the tropical paradise of El Salvador!” He added that Abrego Garcia would stay in El Salvador's custody.

Van Hollen said earlier Thursday that he was not in the country to “vouch for” any set of facts or the administration’s claims about Abrego Garcia’s past, but to advocate for the United States judicial system.

The Salvadoran entered the United States illegally around 2011. In 2019, immigration officials put him into deportation proceedings after he was arrested in a Home Depot parking lot, where his attorneys say he was looking for work as a day laborer. The immigration judge’s order that he not be deported to El Salvador was still in effect when the Trump administration put him on the deportation flight on March 15.

“We need to make sure that the court system works, and due process works because if you take it away for any individual, it’s a very short road to taking it away for every American,” Van Hollen said.

The White House countered Van Hollen’s trip with an emotional briefing room appearance Wednesday by Patty Morin, the mother of Rachel Morin, who was brutally murdered in 2023 while exercising on a popular hiking trail northeast of Baltimore. Morin’s killer, an undocumented immigrant from El Salvador, Victor Martinez-Hernandez, was convicted in court this week of taking the Maryland mom off a trail, slamming her head on rocks, raping her and hiding her body in a drain culvert.

“These are the kind of criminals President Trump wants to remove from our country. These are the kind of criminals we need to remove from our country,” Patty Morin said. “We are American citizens, why should we allow people like this — violent criminals who have no conscience at all — to murder our mothers, our sisters, our daughters?”

The political messaging battle comes as Trump officials continue to argue in court they can’t bring Abrego Garcia to the United States. Xinis has grown increasingly frustrated with the administration’s refusal to provide court-ordered updates on his return, saying officials have done “nothing” to comply with her order. The Justice Department appealed Xinis’ order, but on Thursday a federal appeals court reaffirmed her directive.

The Trump administration deported Abrego Garcia last month along with hundreds of other men to El Salvador’s mega-prison as part of an agreement the White House struck with the Central American country. Shortly afterward, a government lawyer said in court that he encouraged the administration to change its position. He was later put on leave.

The administration has also slowly released details of Abrego Garcia’s past that they say show he is an “Illegal immigrant. Gang member. Domestic abuser,” as the White House rapid response page posted on X. “The new hero of the Democrat Party.”

The Department of Homeland Security released documents, including court filings, that say Abrego Garcia’s wife had sought a restraining order against him for domestic violence. She had a temporary order of protection against him in 2021, according to ABC News, but said this week that after “surviving domestic violence in a previous relationship,” she acted out of “caution” with Abrego Garcia.

“We were able to work through this situation privately as a family, including by going to counseling,” Jennifer Vasquez Sura said. “Kilmar has always been a loving partner and father, and I will continue to stand by him and demand justice for him.”

A DHS official also confirmed a report from the Tennessee Star that said Abrego Garcia was suspected of human trafficking during a December 2022 traffic stop. Garcia was pulled over while transporting several other passengers from Texas to Maryland, but when Tennessee Highway Patrol asked the FBI for guidance, the agency ultimately freed them to go.

And the Justice Department released papers from the Prince George’s County Police Department detailing evidence they say shows Abrego Garcia is a member of the MS-13 gang — including information about what he was wearing and who he was arrested with.

The name of the cop who filled out the form was redacted on the 2019 document released by DOJ. The New Republic reported the police officer who attested to Abrego Garcia’s alleged gang affiliation was suspended for serious misconduct soon after filing the paperwork.