Government Defies District and Supreme Court Orders Regarding Kilmar Abrego Garcia

In its daily status update to federal District Court Judge Paula Xinis, the  Department of Justice declared the government does not believe it is legally obligated to return Kilmar Armando Abrego Garcia to the United States regardless of her court order to do so which the Supreme Court upheld.

Immigration and Customs Enforcement official Evan Katz declared that although ICE removed Kilmar Abrego Garcia to El Salvador illegally, the government has now declared he is a member of the gang MS-13. In ICE’s view, that justifies his removal. There is no evidence that Abrego Garcia has any association with MS-13.

The government did not provide any of the three types of updates Xinis had ordered, ignored the Supreme Court’s ruling that the government must retrieve Abrego Garcia and refused to meet the court’s order that the government must report what it is doing to achieve that retrieval.

Government lawyers leaned on the Supreme Court’s get-out clause saying efforts to retrieve Abrego Garcia must include “due regard for the deference owed to the Executive Branch in the conduct of foreign affairs.” They said now that he is in another country, any effort to retrieve him would overstep into Presidential power over the conduct of foreign affairs. They said the President can only be ordered to lift obstacles within the USA. They said they will not update the court any further so as to avoid intruding on foreign policy. In their view, the government is only obligated to adjust his immigration status so that he can re-enter the USA if El Salvador decides to release him. (CECOT does not release its prisoners.)

The Supreme Court’s ruling does not appear to agree. It includes:

The order properly requires the Government to “facilitate” Abrego Garcia’s release from custody in El Salvador and to ensure that his case is handled as it would have been had he not been improperly sent to El Salvador.

El Salvador’s President Nayib Bukele has traveled to the USA to visit with Donald Trump. The USA is paying El Salvador $6 million to incarcerate people it sends there.

Politico reported former Blackwater CEO Erik Prince has developed a plan to expand rendition to El Salvador to at least 100,000 people from prisons in the USA, too. His plan claims to evade legal barriers by declaring part of CECOT as USA territory, with its operation contracted to El Salvador. The USA could say people sent there are technically not on foreign soil so it has not renditioned them to another country. If that happens, CECOT will simultaneously be USA territory when it is convenient to avoid legal trouble for renditioning to another country, and foreign territory from which the USA claims it cannot bring anyone back. Rumors swirl that similar negotiations are underway with other countries.

This would be an ideal setup to bypass due process by kidnapping anyone the regime wants out of the way regardless of whether they are immigrants or citizens, sending them to a prison in another country and making sure there is no way for them to return.

Trump has publicly declared he would “love” to and even be “honored” to dispose of bothersome citizens this way. Bukele has offered to incarcerate citizens of the USA in addition to expelled immigrants.

Click here for more details.

Click here to read the court filing by ICE official Evan Katz.

Click here for more about the plan exposed by Politico.