Attorney General Pam Bondi told reporters Tuesday that the man mistakenly deported to El Salvador should remain “where he is” amid demands for his return.
Kilmar Abrego-Garcia was mistakenly deported on March 15 despite a protective order, which was granted in 2019, prohibiting his removal from the U.S. due to the risks of persecution, CBS News reported. Abrego-Garcia was reportedly picked up by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents in Baltimore while he was leaving work and heading to pick up his child. He was later sent to the Terrorism Confinement Center, a supermax prison.
The Trump administration admitted in a court filing that Abrego-Garcia was removed from the U.S. through an “administrative error.”
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“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,” ICE Field Office Director Robert Cerna said in the court documents.
Bondi discussed the deportation outside the White House, reaffirming the incident was an error made by the administration.
“He is a known gang member, ICE testified he was a gang member and we believe he should stay where he is,” she said.
“The defense had argued that he was a journeyman, that he was training to be an electrician,” she continued. “Well, the last gang member we arrested, who was a violent murderer, was also hanging wallpaper in a place called the villages in Florida.”
“That’s what these gangs do, they infiltrate our country and they live among us,” Bondi said. “So to say that he was training to be an electrician does not legitimize him from being a violent gang member, and we will continue to fight for the safety of Americans and get these people out of our country.”
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Several senators signed a letter Tuesday demanding Abrego-Garcia be returned to the U.S. The letter cites court filings saying he came to the U.S. in 2011 after “fleeing gang threats in his home country of El Salvador.” He was later arrested by ICE agents in 2019 after “an unfounded and anonymous allegation that he was involved with MS-13, which placed him in deportation proceedings.”
Abrego-Garcia and his family testified that gang members had been attempting to extort his family and recruit him and his brother to join the gang, prompting his family to move and eventually compelling him and his brother to flee to the U.S. “out of fear.”
“Your unwillingness to immediately rectify this ‘administrative error’ is unacceptable,” the senators wrote.
On Monday, Chief Justice John Roberts temporarily paused an order from a lower court that required the Trump administration to return Abrego-Garcia.
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