U.S. Senator Chris Van Hollen (D-MD) speaks to the media throughout a go to to El Salvador to advocate for the discharge of Kilmar Abrego Garcia in San Salvador, El Salvador, April 16, 2025.
Jose Cabezas | Reuters
Sen. Chris Van Hollen confirmed Thursday evening that he met with Kilmar Abrego Garcia, a person who the Trump administration mentioned it mistakenly deported to El Salvador in March.
“I mentioned my predominant purpose of this journey was to fulfill with Kilmar. Tonight I had that likelihood. I’ve known as his spouse, Jennifer, to move alongside his message of affection. I sit up for offering a full replace upon my return,” Van Hollen wrote in a submit on X.
Photographs of Van Hollen’s assembly with Abrego Garcia have been first posted on-line by Salvadoran President Nayib Bukele, who has rebuffed calls to return Abrego Garcia to the U.S.
Van Hollen traveled to El Salvador on Wednesday to push for the discharge of Abrego Garcia after he was not transported again to the U.S. regardless of a Supreme Courtroom ruling that ordered the Trump administration to “facilitate” his return.
The Maryland senator, who represents the state the place Abrego Garcia lived earlier than he was despatched to El Salvador, has known as the Trump administration’s resistance to facilitating Abrego Garcia’s return to the U.S. an try and “cowl up” his wrongful deportation.
Van Hollen has met this week with human rights teams, native embassy employees and prime Salvadoran officers, together with Vice President Félix Ulloa.
Previous to his assembly with Abrego Garcia, Van Hollen mentioned on Thursday that he was denied entry to the jail in El Salvador the place Abrego Garcia is being detained: a terrorism confinement middle known as CECOT.
Van Hollen mentioned he tried to enter the power alongside Chris Newman, the lawyer representing Abrego Garcia’s spouse and mom, to “verify on the well being and wellbeing of Kilmar” however was promptly denied entry.
“We have been stopped by troopers at a checkpoint about 3 kilometers from the CECOT jail,” Van Hollen instructed reporters. “We have been instructed by the troopers that they’d been ordered to not enable us to proceed any additional than that time.”
Throughout a gathering with El Salvador’s vice chairman Wednesday, Van Hollen mentioned his requests to talk with Abrego Garcia, in individual, just about or by telephone, have been denied.
The vice chairman additionally denied a request from Van Hollen that day to facilitate a telephone name between Abrego Garcia and his spouse, who says she has not spoken to him since he was transferred to the Central American facility.
A number of Maryland officers wrote to Homeland Safety Secretary Kristi Noem on Thursday demanding “verifiable proof that Kilmar Abrego Garcia is alive, wholesome and protected.”
“It has now been over a month since Mr. Abrego Garcia was illegally deported by federal authorities in direct violation of a courtroom order, and through that point, his household has acquired no significant affirmation of his well being,” the officers wrote.
Abrego Garcia migrated to the U.S. in 2011 and was protected by a 2019 courtroom order that he couldn’t be despatched again to El Salvador.
This can be a creating story. Please verify again for updates.
