If El Salvador decided to return the Maryland father mistakenly deported to the country’s mega-prison, the US would “provide a plane” due to a Supreme Court ruling, US Attorney General Pam Bondi said Monday.
The Trump administration has said Kilmar Armando Abrego Garcia was sent to El Salvador in March due to an “administrative error.” The administration claims he is a ranking member of the MS-13 gang, but his lawyers and family have rejected those claims.
Bondi did not respond when asked by CNN’s Kaitlan Collins: “So will you return him?”
White House deputy chief of staff Stephen Miller also pointed out that Abrego Garcia is a citizen of El Salvador, suggesting it was “very arrogant” for American media to “tell El Salvador how to handle their own citizens.”
The question was then put to Bukele, who said he “did not have the power” to return Abrego Garcia to the US. “I’m not very fond of releasing terrorists into our country,” he said.
Trump didn’t respond when Collins asked him about his previous comments suggesting he would abide by a ruling from the Supreme Court to “facilitate” Abrego Garcia’s return.
Trump again blames Zelensky for Russia's war against Ukraine
President Donald Trump on Monday acknowledged that Russian President Vladimir Putin started the war against Ukraine, but he also continued to cast blame on Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky and former President Joe Biden.
“That’s a war that should have never been allowed to start. Biden could have stopped it, and Zelensky should have stopped it, and Putin should have never started it. Everybody’s to blame,” Trump said in the Oval Office sitting next to El Salvador’s President Nayib Bukele.
“This was Biden’s war, and I’m trying to stop it,” Trump said.
After his earlier comment about Putin starting the war, Trump went on to suggest Zelensky did when asked about his offer to purchase more patriot missile systems.
“Listen, when you start a war, you gotta know that you can win the war, right? You don’t start a war with someone who’s 20 times your size and then hope people give you some missiles,” Trump said.
El Salvador’s Bukele says he doesn’t have power to return mistakenly deported man to US
Salvadoran President Nayib Bukele said he doesn’t “have the power” to return to the United States a man mistakenly deported to his country.
“How can I return him to the United States? Like, I smuggle him into the United States?” he said when asked repeatedly whether he would return Kilmar Armando Abrego Garcia, who the Trump administration conceded was mistakenly deported to El Salvador’s mega-prison “because of an administrative error.”
Asked by reporters at the Oval Office on Monday whether he has the power to release Abrego Garcia inside El Salvador, Bukele said he does, but that his administration isn’t “very fond of releasing terrorists” in his country.
“You want us to us to go back to releasing criminals so we can go back to being the murder capital of the world? That’s not going to happen,” he said.
The Trump administration has claimed Abrego Garcia, a Maryland father, is a member of the MS-13 gang. His lawyers have denied the claim.
Bukele went on to say his country is “very eager” to help the United States tackle what he called its crime and terrorism problem.
“We’re very eager to help. We know that you have a crime problem, a terrorism problem that you need help with. And we’re a small country, but if we can help, we will do it.”
NOW: El Salvador president arrives at the White House to meet with Trump
President Donald Trump is meeting with El Salvador President Nayib Bukele at the White House today, where the two leaders are expected to discuss their continued partnership — which is helping to facilitate the administration’s deportation policy.
Trump and Bukele will participates in a bilateral meeting in the Oval Office.
More than 200 men accused of being Venezuelan gang members have been deported to a maximum-security megaprison in El Salvador under the Alien Enemies Act.
On Sunday, Trump brushed off concerns about human rights abuses in the infamous prison. “I don’t see it,” he said. “(Bukele’s) taking care of a lot of problems that we have that we really wouldn’t be able to take care of, from a cost standpoint,” Trump said.
The deportations have also prompted complaints and legal challenges from the migrants’ families and from critics who say the administration is trampling on civil liberties.
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