To hear the Democratic Party and their media allies tell it, the Trump administration is snatching legal United States residents off the streets in the middle of the night and then shipping them to foreign countries at will.
The New York Times, for example, claims Kilmar Armando Abrego Garcia “was in the U.S. legally” before he was arrested and deported to El Salvador last month by the Trump administration. While the Trump administration has admitted it erred in deporting Garcia, any claim that he was in the U.S. legally is completely false.
By Garcia’s own admission, he illegally entered the U.S. sometime in 2011. Eight years later, on March 29, 2019, Garcia went to a Home Depot to illegally solicit employment. He was subsequently arrested by the Prince George County Police Department, which transferred him to Immigration and Customs Enforcement custody. ICE then began deportation proceedings against Garcia, and when Garcia sought to be released on bond before his hearing, a judge denied his bond, finding that “the evidence show[s] that he is a verified member of MS-13.” A Department of Justice Executive Office of Immigration Review panel later upheld that finding.
Garcia then went before another immigration judge, who found that he was in the country illegally, and the judge entered a removal order against Garcia. The judge also entered a “withholding of removal” order for Garcia, which meant that while the U.S. could deport him, they could not deport him to El Salvador because the judge believed there was greater than a 50% chance Garcia would be persecuted if he returned to his home country.
The Trump administration has admitted it erred in deporting Garcia to El Salvador. It appears they found the removal order against him, which was still valid, but missed the withholding order that protected him from being deported to El Salvador.
But this is not some case where ICE is sweeping random legal immigrants off the streets and deporting them. Garcia was not in the U.S. legally. He was an illegal immigrant. He went before an immigration judge who ordered his deportation. That deportation order is still valid. As Garcia’s lawyers admit, “Should [the Trump administration] wish to remove Plaintiff Abrego Garcia to any other country, they would have no legal impediment in doing so.”
The Trump administration is absolutely being aggressive when it comes to deporting illegal immigrants. The Washington Examiner has even argued that its use of the Alien Enemies Act is not supported by the law. The named plaintiffs challenging Trump’s use of the Alien Enemies Act will most likely win their case.
TRUMP’S TROUBLING ALIEN ENEMIES ACT CLAIMS
But that does not mean the media should parrot Democratic Party talking points when it comes to the status of illegal immigrants the Trump administration is trying to deport. The public does not trust the Democratic Party when it comes to immigration, nor should they.
If the Democrats’ media allies truly want to help rehabilitate the party on immigration, they desperately need to start being honest when they cover the issue.