President Donald Trump has expressed confidence that the federal government will win its case against Kilmar Abrego Garcia, the Salvadoran immigrant who has returned to the United States for criminal prosecution after being mistakenly deported and sent to a maximum security prison in El Salvador.
“It should be a very easy case,” Trump told NBC News on Saturday.
The president also said it wasn’t his decision to bring back Abrego Garcia, who lived in Maryland with his American citizen wife and children prior to his arrest in March.
But, said Trump, the “Department of Justice decided to do it that way, and that’s fine.”
Donald Trump holds a document with notes about Kilmar Abrego Garcia as he speaks with reporters in the White House on April 18. AP Photo/Alex Brandon
Attorney General Pam Bondi announced Friday that Abrego Garcia had “landed” back in the U.S., months after he was sent to the notorious CECOT facility in what the Trump administration called an “administrative error.”
The Justice Department brought Abrego Garcia back to the U.S. only to prosecute him on charges related to alleged involvement in a human smuggling operation that transported people in the country illegally.
The indictment of Kilmar Abrego Garcia. AP Photo/Jon Elswick
His attorneys said the charges were “baseless” and that there was “no way” a jury would be convinced of his guilt, per the Associated Press.
Despite the admission that deporting Abrego Garcia was a mistake, the Trump administration defended the action, repeatedly characterizing Abrego Garcia as an MS-13 gang member ― something his lawyers and wife have denied.
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Donald Trump, Kilmar Abrego Garcia
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