In a statement Friday evening, White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt dared a federal judge to order El Salvador to return to the U.S. a deported alleged MS-13 gang member, Kilmar Abrego Garcia, who was ‘mistakenly’ deported to El Salvador last month, despite a court order protecting him from being sent back to his home country, as part of Trump’s mass deportation of Tren de Aragua and MS-13 gang members to Centro de Confinamiento del Terrorismo (CECOT).
At a hearing in the U.S. District Court in Greenbelt, Maryland on Friday, Obama appointee Judge Paula Xinis ordered the Trump administration to return Abrego Garcia to the U.S. by 11:59 p.m. Monday, April 7
The defiance by the Trump administration was not matched by the Justice Department, which filed an appeal to the Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals on Friday after a DOJ immigration attorney apologized to Judge Xinis for not being able to persuade the Trump administration to agree to return Abrego Garcia.
Deputy White House Press Secretary Harrison Fields posted a statement by Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt:
“We suggest the Judge contact President @nayibbukele because we are unaware of the judge having jurisdiction or authority over the country of El Salvador.”
NEW FROM @PressSec:
“We suggest the Judge contact President @nayibbukele because we are unaware of the judge having jurisdiction or authority over the country of El Salvador.” https://t.co/lyFSXQfgIL
— Harrison Fields (@HFields47) April 4, 2025
On Tuesday, Leavitt was adamant with reporters that the Trump administration would not be returning Abrego Garcia, “The administration maintains the position that this individual was deported to El Salvador and will not be returning to our country and was a member of the brutal and vicious MS-13 gang.”
Press Secretary SHUTS DOWN fake news hoax that Trump deported an innocent Maryland father:
FACT 1: The individual was a member of the vicious MS-13 gang which Trump designated a foreign terrorist organization
FACT 2: He was involved in human trafficking
FACT 3: Foreign… pic.twitter.com/6BOKZTya1v
— Libs of TikTok (@libsoftiktok) April 1, 2025
In an appearance on Fox News Friday, Homeland Security spokeswoman Tricia McLaughlin affirmed Abrego Garcia is a member of MS-13, “He’s actually a member of MS-13 and was involved in human trafficking … It is a gang that rapes, maims, and kills Americans for sport. They should not be on U.S. soil.”
DHS spokeswoman @TriciaOhio on the deported illegal immigrant MS-13 gang member hailed by the Fake News: “He’s actually a member of MS-13 and was involved in human trafficking … It is a gang that rapes, maims, and kills Americans for sport. They should not be on U.S. soil.” pic.twitter.com/xiCOHoJ0yB
— Rapid Response 47 (@RapidResponse47) April 4, 2025
White House deputy Chief of Staff Stephen Miller posted, “Marxist judge now thinks she’s president of El Salvador.”
Marxist judge now thinks she’s president of El Salvador. https://t.co/64nCpUgMQ5
— Stephen Miller (@StephenM) April 4, 2025
El Salvador’s actual President, Nayib Bukele, mocked Judge Xinis:
https://t.co/ahmffGCdpn pic.twitter.com/oegtIbgvRd
— Nayib Bukele (@nayibbukele) April 4, 2025
Politico reported on Friday’s hearing where the DOJ attorney kept apologizing to the judge for the behavior of the Trump administration (excerpt):
In a rare courtroom exchange at Friday’s hearing, the lawyer defending the government in the case expressed exasperation with the administration’s approach and its refusal to respond to his queries.
“I am also frustrated that I have no answer for you on a lot of these questions,” said Erez Reuveni, an assistant director in the Justice Department’s Office of Immigration Litigation. “The government made a choice here to produce no evidence.”
…At another point, Reuveni said he’d asked why the U.S. couldn’t seek Abrego Garcia’s return and was rebuffed.
“When this case landed on my desk, I asked my clients that very question. I have not received to date an answer that I find satisfactory,” he said.
Shortly before the judge ruled, the visibly frustrated attorney pleaded with Xinis for 24 hours to try to persuade U.S. officials to try to seek Abrego Garcia’s return without intervention by the court.
“I would ask the court to give us, the defendants, one more chance to do this,” Reuveni said. “That’s my recommendation to my client, but so far that hasn’t happened.”
…Abrego Garcia’s status as a potential member of the MS-13 gang is sure to be a focal point of the unfolding dispute. A judge agreed in 2019 that information supplied to police by an informant was persuasive enough to label him a likely member of the gang and justify his continued detention as a danger to the community.
Though Abrego Garcia arrived in the United States in 2012, he did not seek asylum until his detention in 2019, contending that a local gang in El Salvador had been extorting his mother’s pupusa business while trying to force him to join.
Though a judge denied his asylum claim, noting that he filed it far too late, she agreed to block his removal to El Salvador because of his credible fear he might be persecuted there. After that determination, Abrego Garcia was released from detention and has been residing in Maryland with his U.S. citizen wife and child.
More info on Abrego Garcia via WRC-TV (excerpt, more at link):
ICE detained Abrego Garcia, 29, on March 12 near IKEA in College Park (Maryland). His wife, Jennifer, told NBC Washington he had just left the house with their young son and was heading to a bus stop to pick up their two other kids.
“When they put him in the vehicle, they still took me to the vehicle and opened the door and told me to say goodbye to him,” Jennifer said.
“He just told me to take care of my kids, and I told him everything is going to be fine,” she said, fighting tears. “You’re going to come back, because you haven’t done nothing. You have your work permit.”
Jennifer snapped photos of her husband sitting on a curb with his hands behind his back, wearing a neon work shirt. He was a sheet metal worker and began an apprenticeship program.
…Abrego Garcia was given the status of withholding of removal in 2019, according to attorney Lucia Curiel. A document she provided shows the status was granted and cites a clause that provides restriction on deportation but has exceptions in which the person can be removed, such as reasonable grounds to believe the person is a danger.
Curiel said Abrego Garcia was accused by Prince George’s County police of wearing a gang shirt in March 2019. The claim wasn’t substantiated, she said, but she believes that may be the reason he was targeted for deportation.
Abrego Garcia was suspected of being a gang member after he was seen wearing a Chicago Bulls hat and a hoodie, a lawsuit says. A confidential informant advised he was an MS-13 member, according to the document.
In an ICE document, Cerna said Abrego Garcia was arrested because of his “prominent role in MS-13.” Cerna said elsewhere in the document that he was removed because of his “purported membership in MS-13.”
