The administration’s current public remarks, according to Kilmar Abrego Garcia’s doctors, provide evidence that the organization has the authority to bring their client from El Salvador but is choosing not to.
In a court filing this week, the legal team cited Trump’s response in a late-April interview with ABC News, in which he acknowledged that he” could” call Salvadoran President Nayib Bukele to secure Abrego Garcia’s return. Trump defended the deportation of Abrego Garcia, saying,” If] Bukele were the gentleman that you say he is, I would do that.” Abrego Garcia, a reported MS-13 crew part and illegal immigrant, was deported to El Salvador by mistake, according to the Trump administration. Times prior, a judge had decreed that Abrego Garcia may be deported, but not to his native nation.
The government’s comments contradict the administration’s court claim that national security concerns support withholding further information in the case, according to Abrego Garcia’s attorneys in the new filings. The attorneys told District Judge Paula Xinis in their registration that “official statements by the Government consistently confirm that producing this information may not threaten national protection” in parliamentary evidence, broadcast interviews, and social media.
The Justice Department moved to cover its court-ordered luxury log the day before the meeting reference, citing “ongoing political conversations” with El Salvador. The logs lists the documents the administration is refusing to release in terms of state secrets and executive privilege. DOJ officials claimed that making those details people “would possible harm” U.S. foreign relations and that the information is backed up by a stipulated confidentiality order.
According to threats from Barrio 18, a rival group to MS-13, Abrego Garcia, who entered the United States illegally in 2011 was given legal protection from deportation in El Salvador in 2019. However, the Trump presidency acknowledged in March that Abrego Garcia was mistaken to be a member of a group of migrants detained in El Salvador’s CECOT jail. He has since been relocated to a less secure service.
Although Xinis first directed the government to “facilitate” and “effectuate” Abrego Garcia’s return on April 4, a decision partially supported by the Supreme Court three days later, the parties have since argued over the scope of that obligation, particularly regarding whether the government has take immediate steps to help Abrego Garcia return to the country or whether the order just mandated that the United States government be willing to accept him if El Salvador volunteer to do so. Last month, the judge accused the administration of a “willful and bad-faith refusal” to follow the discovery orders.
In court filings, the DOJ asserted that it has already provided “robust” responses and that further information would not help the case. However, the legal team for Abrego Garcia claims that the secrecy accusations are being used to hide accountability. In a filing from Monday, they wrote that” the state secrets privilege is not intended to conceal governmental errors or misconduct.”
DEMOCRATS BERATE NOEM FORDON’T ACHEL THE ABREGO GARCIA RETURN
Attorney General Pam Bondi, Secretary of State Marco Rubio, and Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem’s public remarks against Abrego Garcia’s return have also been cited in court as further evidence that secrecy claims are incompatible with the administration’s own conduct.
A hearing on the deportation issue’s upcoming steps is scheduled for Friday afternoon in Greenbelt, Maryland.
