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US Judge fumes at Trump admn over delay in bringing back man ‘wrongly’ deported to El Salvador; Prez says ‘I love that’
US District Judge Paula Xinis's decision from Sunday reiterates her previous decision to order Kilmar Abrego Garcia's return to the US by Monday evening.
A federal court delivered a damning ruling against the Trump administration after immigration officials acknowledged that they had accidentally transported Kilmar Abrego Garcia, a man residing in the US, to an El Salvadorian prison.
On March 15, Garcia, an El Salvadorian green card holder who has been residing in Maryland since 2011, was unintentionally sent to the infamous prison along with Venezuelan men who were gang members.
According to Garcia's lawyer, police arrested him from an Ikea parking lot on March 12 while his 5-year-old autistic kid was in the backseat of his vehicle.
Judge Paula Xinis's order on Kilmar Abrego Garcia
US District Judge Paula Xinis's decision from Sunday reiterates her previous decision to order Garcia's return to the US by Monday evening.
According to the judge, Garcia was detained “without legal basis” and taken “without any lawful authority,” which is a “direct violation” of US law. She described her predicament as a “grievous error” that “shocks the conscience.”
“Defendants seized Abrego Garcia without any lawful authority; held him in three separate domestic detention centers without legal basis; failed to present him to any immigration judge or office; and forcibly transported him to El Salvador,” Xinis wrote on Sunday. “Once there, U.S. officials secured his detention in a facility that, by design, deprives its detainees of adequate food, water, and shelter, fosters routine violence; and places him with his persecutors.”
However, Trump authorities maintain they don't have the power to free him from El Salvadorian jail, thus they cannot bring him back.
Meanwhile, the Justice Department requested an appellate court to overturn Judge Xinis' order. The appeals court was anticipated to make a decision by Sunday night.
Judge hits back at Trump administration's claims
on Sunday, Xinis clapped back at Trump administration's assertions, writing: “They do indeed cling to the stunning proposition that they can forcibly remove any person—migrant and U.S. citizen alike —to prisons outside the United States, and then baldly assert they have no way to effectuate return because they are no longer the 'custodian,' and the court thus lacks jurisdiction.”
“As a practical matter, the facts say otherwise,” she stated.
Garcia's lawyer stated that he escaped El Salvador and arrived in the US to avoid gang violence while he was a minor. In a court briefing, he said gang members began stalking, hitting, and threatening to kidnap and murder him in an effort to extort his parents starting around 2006.
In 2019, a US immigration judge granted Garcia legal protection from deportation, which means that he had been wrongfully removed. Garcia's attorney has claimed that he has no affiliation with any gangs and has never faced criminal charges.
The family of Garcia, including his US citizen wife Jennifer Vasquez Sura, has been demanding his return following his deportation in mid-March.
In the 22-page ruling, Judge Xinis chastised US officials for asserting that they were powerless to address what they have called an “administrative error” that resulted in his deportation.
“As defendants acknowledge, they had no legal authority to arrest him, no justification to detain him, and no grounds to send him to El Salvador - let alone deliver him into one of the most dangerous prisons in the Western Hemisphere,” Xinis stated.
Here's what Trump & WH have said; Is El Salvador President to visit US?
White House representatives persisted in defending Garcia's deportation. In an appearance on Fox News on Sunday, Attorney General Pam Bondi restated the government's assertion that Garcia belongs to the MS-13 gang, which the Trump administration has classified as a terrorist organisation. Bondi, however, did not provide any proof.
During his Sunday night flight back to Washington, DC, from Florida, Trump also seemed to make remarks about the case.
Speaking to reporters on Air Force One, Trump said, “He's in MS-13,” without specifically naming Garcia.
The President of El Salvador, Nayib Bukele, is scheduled to visit the White House in the coming weeks, and Trump confirmed that the two leaders will talk about the prospect of El Salvador putting American citizens in jail.
“I love that,” he hailed the proposal. “I think if we could get El Salvador or somebody to take them, I'd be very happy with it, but I have to see what the law says,” he added.
