US government counterattacks in Kilmar Abrego García case: From deporting him ‘by mistake’ to painting him as a monster

In this story, Kilmar Abrego García, the Salvadoran migrant mistakenly deported to his native country despite having a court order prohibiting his removal from the United States, is David, and Goliath, the Donald Trump administration. Justice is on Abrego García’s side, with the Supreme Court having ordered his return to American soil. But in this version of the biblical tale, it is far from clear that the young man will be able to defeat the giant Republican administration, which, after several court defeats, has decided to employ a new attack strategy in a case that has shaken the country. Now it seeks to portray Abrego García as a monster.

The government has released a series of documents intended to justify Abrego García’s deportation, after admitting that it was carried out due to an “administrative error.” After refusing for weeks to provide evidence in its case against the Salvadoran, the files released by the Departments of Justice and Homeland Security are an attempt to substantiate its claim that Abrego García is a violent and dangerous criminal, a member of the Salvadoran criminal gang MS-13, in order to validate his deportation to El Salvador along with other alleged gang members. The release comes after two federal judges reprimanded the White House for these deportations.

Among the documents released Wednesday by the Justice Department is a Maryland police file detailing how officers assessed Abrego García as a member of MS-13 during a 2019 arrest. He had no criminal record at the time, which is also noted in the report, and his lawyers and family have strongly denied that the 29-year-old Salvadoran is a member of any criminal gang.

In the file titled “Gang Field Interview Sheet,” dated March 28, 2019, the Prince George’s County Police Department describes how they approached Abrego García along with three others for loitering in a Home Depot parking lot in Hyattsville, Maryland. Abrego García later said in a court filing that he was there looking for work as a laborer.

The officers identified him as a criminal based on the clothing he was wearing. “He was wearing a Chicago Bulls cap and a hoodie with rolls of money covering the eyes, ears, and mouths of presidents of various denominations. Officers know that such attire is indicative of Hispanic gang culture,” the statement reads. The officers asserted that such insignia, which “represent ‘see, hear, and be silent,’” proved that Abrego García was a member of MS-13, something they confirmed with “a reliable confidential source.” This source also told them that, within the group, the man held “the rank of ‘Check,’ with the nickname ‘Chele.’”

After that encounter with the police, Abrego García was handed over to Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE). Later that same year, an immigration judge barred him from being deported back to El Salvador, ruling that he had proven his life would be in danger if he returned to his home country, where his family had been victims of extortion by local gangs when Abrego García was just a child. In fact, the Salvadoran immigrant emigrated to the United States illegally in 2012 to escape gangs, when he was 16 years old. With the judge’s order, he was able to remain in the United States and receive a work permit.

He had no further run-ins with immigration authorities until this year, when he was detained by ICE agents in mid-March and, three days later, placed on a flight back to El Salvador. Abrego García was one of more than 200 Salvadoran and Venezuelan immigrants deported without due process by the Trump administration on March 15 to an infamous prison built by the Central American country’s president, Nayib Bukele, where numerous reports of poor conditions, mistreatment, and human rights violations have emerged. For the expulsions, the Trump administration relied on the Alien Enemies Act of 1798, which has only been used three times in history, and always in the context of war.

In Abrego García’s case, the Supreme Court ordered the Trump administration a week ago to “facilitate” his return to the United States. The government, however, maintains it lacks the authority to do so because he is imprisoned in a foreign country. And the Salvadoran president asserted Monday during a visit to the White House that he has no intention of releasing him because he is a “terrorist.”

“He is not coming back to our country. President Bukele said he was not sending him back. That’s the end of the story,” Attorney General Pam Bondi insisted at a press conference on Wednesday. Even if El Salvador wanted to return him to the United States, Bondi added, the government wouldn’t accept him and would deport him again. “If he wanted to send him back, we would give him a plane ride back. There was no situation ever where he was going to stay in this country. None, none.”

The courts, however, aren’t buying any of the government’s arguments. This Thursday, a federal appeals court said the Trump administration’s claim that it can do nothing to free Abrego García “should be shocking.” In another judicial setback for Trump, a three-judge panel of the 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals said the Republican administration is “asserting a right to stash away residents of this country in foreign prisons without the semblance of due process that is the foundation of our constitutional order.” The judges thus refused to stay the decision of the judge overseeing the case, Paula Xinis, to order Trump administration officials to testify under oath to determine whether they complied with her instruction to facilitate Abrego García’s return.

At a hearing Tuesday, Maryland District Judge Xinis demanded that the government provide information and evidence within the next two weeks about what it has done — or failed to do — to bring Abrego García back. Meanwhile, another federal judge, James Boasberg of Washington, threatened Wednesday to hold the Trump administration in criminal contempt for willfully disobeying an order he issued on March 15 to halt deportation flights to El Salvador that included Abrego García.

“Kilmar has always been a loving partner and father”

Another document the government released Wednesday was a copy of a protection order that Abrego García’s wife, Jennifer Vásquez Sura, filed against her husband in 2021. “Kilmar Abrego Garcia had a history of violence and was not the upstanding ‘Maryland Man’ the media has portrayed him as. According to court filings, Garcia’s wife sought a domestic violence restraining order against him, claiming he punched, scratched, and ripped off her shirt, among other harm. This MS-13 gang member is not a sympathetic figure,” the Department of Homeland Security wrote on X when publishing the report.

The complaint alleges that Abrego García “punched and scratched” Vásquez Sura, “ripped off” her shirt, and “grabbed and bruised” her. At the time, the court ordered Abrego García to have no contact with Vásquez Sura, to vacate her home, and to stay away from another relative’s house. The case, however, was dismissed in June 2021 after the woman failed to appear for a final hearing, and the couple moved back in together.

Vásquez Sura has come out to defend her husband against the government’s accusations that he is a violent and abusive husband. Speaking to the press, she clarified that she requested the protection order as a precautionary measure, following a disagreement with Abrego García, because she had already survived a previous instance of domestic violence with another partner. However, the issue with Abrego García “did not escalate,” and the woman decided not to pursue the case.

“We were able to work through this situation privately as a family, including by going to counseling. Our marriage only grew stronger in the years that followed. No one is perfect, and no marriage is perfect,” Vásquez Sura said. “That is not a justification for ICE’s action of abducting him and deporting him to a country where he was supposed to be protected from deportation,” she added.

Meanwhile, Vásquez Sura and her husband’s lawyers continue their legal battle for the return of Abrego García, who has already spent a month in the Cecot prison in his home country. “Kilmar has always been a loving partner and father, and I will continue to stand by him and demand justice for him,” his wife maintains.

Several members of the Democratic Party have also joined their fight. Hillary Clinton, former Secretary of State under the Obama administration and onetime presidential hopeful, posted on social media this week calling on “Americans of conscience” to demonstrate against the Salvadoran’s deportation. “If they can ship Kilmar Abrego Garcia to a foreign prison — accused of no crime, with no trial — they can do it to anyone,” she warned.

Maryland Senator Chris Van Hollen traveled to San Salvador on Wednesday to push for the migrant’s release. This Thursday, he managed to meet with him, the first person to have direct contact with the prisoner since his expulsion. The Democrat shared a photo of the two together with a brief caption: “I said my main goal of this trip was to meet with Kilmar. Tonight I had that chance. I have called his wife, Jennifer, to pass along his message of love. I look forward to providing a full update upon my return.” Despite the government’s offensive, there are still new chapters to come in this story.

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