The democratic senator visited El Salvador in the hopes of meeting deported illegal immigrants who have been placed in the country’s mega prisons, but the government denied entry to the facility.
Maryland Democratic Sen. Chris Van Hollen landed in the San Salvador capital on Wednesday and met with Vice President Felix Ullore. According to A press conference given by lawmakers later. Van Hollen was there to highlight the light-form of Kilmar Abrego Garcia, a Salvador national who lives illegally in the United States before being deported to his country in March. (Related: Exclusive: GOP has launched a survey of taxpayer-funded groups.
Abrego Garcia is currently being held at the Terrorist Confinement Centre (CECOT), a mega prison facility built by President Naive Buquere’s administration, and aims to house the country’s ramp-rising gang population.
“I asked the Vice President if I could meet Abrego Garcia,” Van Hollen said at a press conference. “And he said, ‘Well, you need to make the previous regulations to visit CECOT.’ ”
“I said, I’m not interested in going on a CECOT tour at this moment. I just want to meet Abrego Garcia,” he continued. “He said he couldn’t make it happen.”
Senator Chris Van Hollen will speak at a press conference from the urban perspective in Antigu Kuscatlan, El Salvador on April 16, 2025 (Photo by Marvin Recinos/AFP)
After illegally moving to the United States in 2011, Abrego Garcia eventually settled in Maryland and married a US citizen. In 2019, he was arrested by the Prince George County Police Department and was criticized by informants to be trusted to have a MS-13 gang member tie. The immigration judge handed him an order to expel him, but he later managed to get withholding the tax for removal.
Abrego Garcia stayed in the United States until immigration agents arrested him on March 15th. Later that month he informed his wife that he was being moved to CECOT.
The Trump White House acknowledges that his deportation was the result of administrative errors, but withholding the removal order banned repatriation to El Salvador – the administration claimed he is an MS-13 member who is not welcomed by the US Bukele on Monday.
Van Hollen repeatedly referred to Abrego Garcia’s arrest as “adduction,” calling his deportation illegal to El Salvador. Senator staff told the Daily Callenor News Foundation he missed Tuesday when he called Abrego Garcia a US citizen.
At a press conference Wednesday in El Salvador, Van Hollen appeared to suggest that Abrego Garcia was legally living in the United States at the time of the arrest.
“In fact, Abrego Garcia is legally in the United States,” the senator told reporters. “In fact, the immigration judge discovered several years ago that if he was returned to El Salvador, he was given protected status and a work permit.”
Withholding of removal can provide conditional protection from migrants’ repatriation to their home countries and provide job benefits, but several immigration experts who spoke with the DCNF said it does not confer legal status.
“By definition, [Abrego Garcia] Art Arthur, a fellow at the Center for Immigration Studies, said:
Matt O’Brien – the investigative director and former immigration judge at the Institute for Immigration Reform Law – said withholding tax for removal means that the US cannot deport foreigners to countries listed in the withholding order. Withholding remains a final, unapproved order of removal, O’Brien noted.
Van Hollen met Abrego Garcia’s wife, mother and brother, but another member of the senator said he never reached out to him after his daughter was killed by illegal immigrants.
Rachel Morin’s mother, Patty Morin, confirmed in an interview that Van Hollen never contacted her or members of the Morin family as Van Hollen was brutally murdered by illegal immigrants from El Salvador. Rachel’s murderer Victor Antonio Martinez Hernandez was found guilty of rape and murder on Tuesday.
“[Van Hollen] He didn’t call our family, he didn’t give the will of sad dol,” Morin said. Tuesday night Fox News. “There was no action [by the] In some way, the Democratic Party. ”
“In Maryland, none of the senators did anything to help search for my daughter’s murderer,” Patty said.
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