Trump Admin Admits Migrant Married to U.S. Citizen Wrongly Imprisoned in El Salvador — But Says They Still Can’t Bring Him Back

CNN’s Priscilla Alvarez reported on Tuesday on the latest court filing from the Trump administration regarding a man named Kilmar Abrego Garcia, who ICE admitted was deported to an El Salvador mega-prison by “administrative error” – despite both having “protected status” in the U.S. and being married to a U.S. citizen. The Trump administration continued, however, to allege Abrego Garcia has ties to MS-13 – the notorious El Salvadoran gang.

“Trump administration has admitted to mistakenly deporting a Maryland father to a Salvadoran super prison. Federal lawmakers confirmed that the man who was granted protected status in 2019 was deported due to quote, ‘An administrative error.’ Even some supporters of the president, including podcaster Joe Rogan, have expressed concerns about the possibility of mistaken deportations,” began CNN anchor John Berman before playing a short clip of Rogan saying:

You got to get scared that people who are not criminals are getting, like, lassoed up and deported and sent to, like… El Salvador prisons, like that kind of shit. This is kind of crazy that that could be possible. That’s horrific and that’s, again, that’s bad for the cause.

“All right, let’s get right to CNN’s Priscilla Alvarez, who’s got the details on this one case involving this, as we said, Maryland father. What have you learned, Priscilla?” Berman added, throwing it over to Alvarez.

“John, we have been reporting on multiple families and attorneys who say that people were sent to this El Salvadoran prison who shouldn’t have been there to begin with. And in this case, Immigration and Customs Enforcement is saying very bluntly that this was due to an administrative error with this Salvadoran national in particular,” Alvarez began, adding:

Now, a little bit of background as to who this is. His name is Kilmar Abrego Garcia. He’s a Salvadoran national. He crossed into the U.S. around 2011. His first brush with law enforcement appears to be in 2019 when he was detained along with a group of men who were loitering around a Maryland home depot. And the local police department deemed that he was a member of MS-13, saying or arguing that it was due to his attire and a confidential informant.

Now, efforts to get more information from the police department about these alleged ties were not fruitful, according to his attorney, when he was going through his immigration court proceedings again back in 2019. Ultimately, that year, an immigration judge granted him a protected status known as withholding from removal. That is to say that if he were returned to El Salvador, he could face persecution. So while he was still considered removable from the United States, it just couldn’t be to El Salvador.

Now, this court declaration essentially admits fault in sending him to El Salvador. It also provides a glimpse as to what exactly unfolded. Now the ICE official says that this man, Abrego Garcia, was not on the initial manifest for those three flights that went to El Salvador in mid-March. What occurred was as people were pulled off of the flights, for they say various reasons, he was moved up on the list. Then it says this, and I’m going to quote from the court declaration here, quote, ‘Through administrative error, Abrego Garcia was removed from the United States to El Salvador. This was an oversight and the removal was carried out in good faith based on the existence of a final order of removal and Abrego Garcia’s purported membership in MS-13.’

So, the administration is standing by these alleged ties to MS-13, but saying that he should not have been sent or rather that it was an error that he was sent to the mega prison in El Salvador. Now, what is similar in this court declaration and in the story, as many others, is that his wife, who is a U.S. citizen, had been looking at handout videos from El Salvador, and that is how she identified him.

Now, all of this is part of an ongoing lawsuit, so we’ll see how and what the judge rules in this case. But critically, John, the administration’s saying they can’t retrieve him from El Salvador. As U.S. officials have told me, those who have been sent there are now in Salvadoran custody, and it is up to the Salvadoran president what happens next.

“So he was sent there by mistake, but they can’t get him back. Priscilla Alvarez, I know there will be more developments on this story. Thank you so much for sharing your reporting on this,” concluded Berman.

Watch the clip above via CNN.