Trump Administration Says It Is Not Required to Bring Wrongly Deported Man Back to US

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Lawyers for the government have been providing daily updates on the case.

President Donald Trump’s administration can only take steps to remove “domestic obstacles” for the potential return of a man it erroneously deported, not force the El Salvadoran government to release him, according to a new court filing.

The government’s position is that an order requiring it to facilitate the return of Kilmar Abrego Garcia means “remov[ing] any domestic obstacles that would otherwise impede” Garcia’s ability to return to the United States, lawyers for the administration said in the April 13 filing.

U.S. officials deported Garcia to his home country of El Salvador in March. Garcia was ordered deported in 2019 based on allegations that he is a member of the MS-13 gang, but he was granted what’s called withholding of removal, a protection that prevented his return to El Salvador because a judge agreed he could face danger there.

U.S. officials said in previous filings that Garcia was deported in error.
A federal judge on April 4 ordered the government to “facilitate and effectuate” the return of Abrego Garcia to the United States by the end of April 7. The U.S. Supreme Court blocked the order temporarily.
Justices on April 10 said that the government must facilitate the return of the El Salvadoran native, but that the judge must also clarify what she meant by effectuate “with due regard for the deference owed to the Executive Branch in the conduct of foreign affairs.”

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That judge, U.S. District Judge Paula Xinis, in an updated order, removed the word effectuate but told the government to “take all available steps to facilitate the return of Abrego Garcia to the United States as soon as possible.”

Soon after, she ordered the government to provide her with daily updates on the case.
In the first update, a State Department official said Abrego Garcia is alive and secure in the Terrorism Confinement Center in El Salvador. In the second update, a separate filing lodged on April 13, a U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement official said that there were “no updates for the Court beyond what was provided yesterday.”
Lawyers for Abrego Garcia have accused officials of being recalcitrant and recently urged the judge to order the government to take “all available steps to release and return Abrego Garcia to Maryland.”

That includes requesting the release of Abrego Garcia from the prison in El Salvador, providing air transportation for Abrego Garcia, and dispatching personnel to accompany him upon his release to make sure he can safely reach an aircraft that will fly him back to the United States, the lawyers said.

Government lawyers said in response, in one of the April 13 filings, that the request should be denied.

Reading that “facilitate” means removing domestic obstacles, but nothing else, “follows directly from the Supreme Court’s order,” they said, pointing to how the court emphasized any order must give due regard to Executive Branch authorities over foreign affairs.

“On the flipside, reading ‘facilitate’ as requiring something more than domestic measures would not only flout the Supreme Court’s order, but also violate the separation of powers,” the lawyers said. “The federal courts have no authority to direct the Executive Branch to conduct foreign relations in a particular way, or engage with a foreign sovereign in a given manner. That is the ‘exclusive power of the President as the sole organ of the federal government in the field of international relations.’”

The lawyers also said that the court should not order it to produce documents outlining the U.S.-El Salvador pact for sending illegal immigrants to El Salvador and having them imprisoned there.

“It would be inappropriate for this Court to hastily order production of these sensitive documents,” the filing stated.

A demand for testimony from U.S. officials about the case is inappropriate because, if given, that “could interfere with ongoing diplomatic discussions,” the lawyers added.

They noted that El Salvador’s president, Nayib Bukele, was currently in the United States. Bukele is set to meet with Trump on Monday, about 24 hours ahead of the next hearing in Abrego Garcia’s case.

Original News Source Link – Epoch Times

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