S6, Special Episode: Kilmar Armando Abrego Garcia and the rule of law

On this special bonus episode of the Respecting Religion podcast, we are featuring a conversation that could not wait until our normal release date. In this still-developing story, Kilmar Armando Abrego Garcia was mistakenly removed by the U.S. government from Maryland to El Salvador. His case and series of injustices are not just things that move all of us as people of faith, but there are also profound ramifications of this situation on due process, the rule of law and freedom for everyone living in our country.

Our next full episode of Respecting Religion will feature a conversation with Melissa Rogers, a lawyer who served in two different presidential administrations leading the White House Office of Faith-based and Neighborhood Partnerships. While recording that episode, the conversation turned to this ongoing injustice, and we decided that part of our conversation couldn’t wait until our normal release date.

SHOW NOTES

Articles with additional information: 

Timeline: Wrongful deportation of Kilmar Abrego Garcia to El Salvador (ABC News)

Video: Jennifer Vasquez making her statement supporting her husband (ABC News)

Article: Democrats Land in El Salvador, Seeking Release of Maryland Resident (New York Times)

 

Interested in calling your congressional representatives about this issue? Here’s how you can find their contact information: 

Click here to find your representative in the U.S. House

Click here to find your U.S. Senators

 

Transcript: Season 6, Special Episode: Kilmar Armando Abrego Garcia and the rule of law (some parts of this transcript have been edited for clarity)

 

AMANDA: Hi, Respecting Religion listeners. It’s Amanda Tyler, and I’m here with my co-host Holly Hollman. We’re skipping the introductory music today to bring you a special bonus episode of the show.

First, we want to note that we are releasing this episode just hours after we heard the news of the passing of Pope Francis. We mourn with people around the world, and we want to extend our love and support especially to our Catholic siblings in Christ.

We are releasing this special episode to talk about another important issue in this huge moment that we are all living in right now, and that is the still developing story of Kilmar Armando Abrego Garcia, who was mistakenly removed by the U.S. government from Maryland to El Salvador.

HOLLY: Our next episode of this podcast features a conversation with Melissa Rogers, a lawyer who served in two different presidential administrations, leading the White House Office of Faith-Based and Neighborhood Partnerships. While recording that episode, we spoke at length about this case, and we decided that part of that conversation couldn’t wait until our normal release date.

AMANDA: After being deported to El Salvador by an admitted mistake of the government, Mr. Abrego Garcia has been wrongfully jailed for 37 days and counting. This case and a series of injustices are not just things that move all of us as people of faith, but there are also profound ramifications of this situation on due process, the rule of law, and freedom for everyone living in our country, including U.S. citizens.

Melissa gives an overview of the situation and shares ways that you can speak out and call for his return. We wanted to release this part of our conversation today, which we recorded last week. We’ve worked to update it some to make it as current as possible, but please bear with us as this continues to be a rapidly changing story.

HOLLY: After the music, you’ll hear Melissa share an overview of the case, and you’ll hear our conversation about it.

 

[music]

 

MELISSA ROGERS: Another thing that I’d like to talk about that’s particularly on my mind, because it’s important from a human rights perspective, is the case of a man named Kilmar Armando Abrego Garcia.

This is a man who is currently sitting in a prison in El Salvador because of a mistake our government made. A district court decision in this case explains that he was born and raised in El Salvador, and his family owned a successful small business. His family was threatened with death by a gang in El Salvador because they wouldn’t give in to its demands.

The gang demanded that this young man, Abrego Garcia, be turned over to them, but the family wouldn’t do it. Ultimately, the family sent him to the United States to live with his older brother in Maryland. He lived there for many years without lawful status.

In early 2019, while waiting near the Home Depot as a day laborer, Abrego Garcia was picked up by the Department of Homeland Security for his lack of lawful status in the country, and the government initiated removal proceedings against him. And removal proceedings are what the government does before an immigration judge before they deport somebody. They give them a chance to say why they should not be deported. Now, this is the kind of due process that we just take for granted in this country.

In the court case, Garcia conceded his deportability, but he also applied for asylum as well as withholding of removal. Let me explain that term. In the case, Abrego Garcia was saying that this withholding of the removal was necessary by the United States government because of the threats that he faced in El Salvador. In other words, he was telling the United States government that they should not remove him out of the country to El Salvador, given the fact that gangs had been threatening him and his family there.

After the full evidentiary hearing, the immigration judge granted Garcia withholding of removal to El Salvador because of concern about him being tortured if he would be sent back to El Salvador. So for the next six years, he lived in Maryland with his wife and kids. He complied fully with ICE directives. That’s the Department of Homeland Security system that deals with deportations.

On March 12, 2025, while driving home from work with his young son in the car, he was stopped by ICE agents — they’re agents of the Department of Homeland Security — who had no warrant for his arrest and no lawful basis to take him into custody. They only told him that his status had changed.

Well, they took him to various places in the United States and then transported him to a terrorism confinement center, which is known as CECOT, in El Salvador, which the judge referred to — and I’m quoting here — as a notorious super-max prison known for widespread human rights violations and, quote, “one of the most dangerous prisons in the Western Hemisphere.” And there, male detainees were stripped and shackled and head-shaved, marched into prison.

Well, a district court judge, when his lawyers took issue with this, said that his detention appeared to be wholly lawless, without notice, legal justification, or due process, and the U.S. government conceded in court that it was administrative error, because they should not have deported him to El Salvador. There was a legal standing order, preventing that kind of deportation.

So the district court said that the government had to correct their mistake. They had to bring him back from El Salvador. The Supreme Court heard the case, unanimously said that the United States government must facilitate his release from custody in El Salvador and ensure that — I’m quoting here — “ensure that his case is handled as it would have been had he not been improperly sent to El Salvador.”

They also said the district court had to show due deference to the executive branch’s conduct of foreign policy. So that was an issue there, too. Subsequently, however, in an Oval Office meeting with President Trump, the president of El Salvador, President Nayib Bukele, said that he would not return Abrego Garcia, treating it as a laughable question.

Before or during the meeting, President Trump could have requested that Abrego Garcia be returned to this country, and President Bukele would have undoubtedly complied. But President Trump and his administration so far appear to be refusing to make any effort to return this man to the United States. Indeed, they are now insisting that his deportation wasn’t an error after all. As the district court judge said, this case shocks the conscience. So thank you for letting me go into some detail to describe it.

It also shocks the conscience about its implication and its inescapable logic. By the administration’s logic, it could pick up American citizens off the streets of our country and send them to vicious prisons in other countries where torture is common without any due process and without any delay. And then if we are successful in proving that this was a mistake, they could simply say, Oops, well, you know, too bad; we’re not going to do anything about it.

And that’s what’s happening right now to a human being, and I think our faith really has something to say about this, that this is wrong. I think our citizenship requires us to stand up and to say to our government that this is wrong and that they must return this person from El Salvador and that they must stop this action and other actions which deprive people of due process.

If there isn’t due process for every one of us, then there is not due process for any of us, because any of us, including American citizens, could be picked up by the government and, you know, treated this way or in some similar way. And in the United States, we are very used to having an opportunity to make our case when allegations have been made against us before there is a judgment, especially such a serious judgment against us.

And what this case suggests to me is that can no longer be taken for granted. That is no longer something we should assume, and it’s something that we should stand up for and stand together against at this time in our nation’s history, where there are real threats of authoritarianism, real threats to the rule of law, and that would include threats to due process for each and every one of us.

AMANDA: Yeah. I’m really grateful, Melissa, that you did that extended explanation for our listeners and for the podcast, because, you know, we’re living through this moment. We’re living through history. This feels like one of those pivot moments in history to me, for our country and for our world.

And, you know, I like you — I haven’t been in the Oval Office before, Melissa. I know you have quite a bit. But to see that place, that really important place in American history and use it, as you said, almost like a joke — I mean, it felt — it completely ignores the dignity of this human person whose life is in severe jeopardy right now, for his loved ones who fear for his safety and his life right now, and for the president of the United States to act like there is no leverage that the country can do —

I mean, we just lived through and we are continuing to this tariff trade war. Right? We know that there are all kinds of incentives that the United States can do for all kinds of different things. And the fact that they act as if there’s absolutely nothing they can do to convince the president of El Salvador to extradite him or send him back to the country is ridiculous. It really insults, I think, the intelligence of the American people, and it has dire consequences in this moment.

MS. ROGERS: Yeah. Thank you, Amanda. Well said. Not just for the reasons you said, but, of course, we’re actually paying El Salvador for the imprisonment of these people at this notorious prison there, so we have a — we’d have a lot of leverage anyway. But we have incredible leverage because we are paying and continuing to pay for a period of time where the U.S. still expresses an interest in saying that they will imprison people we send to them for a year while the U.S. figures out next steps.

So we have lots of leverage here, and to not, you know, fix this mistake, which was admitted in court by the United States government, as, quote/unquote, administrative error on their part, to not fix this mistake is unconscionable, and to see it play out as a kind of joke in the Oval Office just heaped insult upon injury.

HOLLY: And, again, in direct contravention of an order of the U.S. Supreme Court that says to facilitate his return. So we know that there’s a lot at stake here.

MS. ROGERS: A unanimous Supreme Court.

HOLLY: That should be noted, unanimous Supreme Court. So this shows that there are a lot of concerns here. What are we going to do? What is this president going to do to comply with the law and the constitutional structure that we have, where the court is supposed to be the final arbiter of what’s required under the Constitution, as well as this episode that you describe that is so insulting and demeaning and really disregards human dignity?

MS. ROGERS: Yes.

HOLLY: So we know that this is not over, and there has been more attention given to it, and we certainly hope that people will pay attention and will demand that this government act according to the law and get him back, return him.

MS. ROGERS: Yes. So in sum, the Trump administration violated a 2019 immigration order, prohibiting the United States government from deporting Abrego Garcia to El Salvador due to concerns about gang threats against him in that country.

It also violated Abrego Garcia’s right to due process by failing to allow him to contest his deportation before sending him to a notorious El Salvador prison. But rather than bringing Abrego Garcia back to the United States and fixing these errors, the administration is now insisting it has done nothing wrong, and thus far refusing to facilitate his release from custody in El Salvador.

The Trump administration is making a bunch of allegations against Abrego Garcia, saying he’s a gang member, even though that’s not been proven, and he insists that’s false. It’s citing domestic disputes, even though his wife has been begging for his release and insisting that he’s a loving partner and father.

Again, in this country, we don’t just assume allegations against individuals are true and punish them. Instead, we give people an opportunity to respond to allegations against them before any judgment is considered. That didn’t happen here, and that’s wrong.

If you share concerns about this matter, we’d ask that you consider contacting your member of Congress to urge them to speak out. Some are already leading on these issues, including Chris Van Hollen, a senator who just returned from a meeting with Abrego Garcia in El Salvador.

Again, this case is about much more than one man. It’s about who we are as a country, and it could affect any of us, even U.S. citizens.

Let me close with some words from an opinion written about this case on April 17 by Judge Harvie Wilkinson, an appellate judge appointed by President Ronald Reagan.

Judge Wilkinson said — and I quote: “It is difficult in some cases to get to the very heart of the matter, but in this case, it is not hard at all. The government is asserting a right to stash away residents of this country in foreign prisons without the semblance of due process that is the foundation of our constitutional order.

“Further, it claims, in essence, that because it has rid itself of custody of Abrego Garcia, that there is nothing that can be done. This should be shocking, not only to judges, but to the intuitive sense of liberty that Americans far removed from courthouses still hold dear.”

These are powerful words from the federal judiciary. I hope every American will consider them.

 

[music]

 

AMANDA: We’ll have much more of our conversation with Melissa Rogers on the next episode of this podcast. I also want to point people to a few other items regarding this situation. We’ll add some links in our show notes to stories on this case and a video of Jennifer Vasquez making her statement supporting her husband in front of the courthouse last week.

HOLLY: And Melissa mentioned the importance of calling your members of Congress to tell them to do something about this situation. That is an important step for all of us to take. You can call your lawmakers’ offices in D.C. or their district or state to let them know you’re upset about the situation and that you want them to do something and that you support your members of Congress who are working to meet with Mr. Garcia.

AMANDA: Yes. Please reach out to your members of Congress but also to your friends and neighbors, too. I agree with what Melissa said in the conversation. My faith first requires me to stand against injustices.

And in our country, if there isn’t due process for every one of us living here, then there isn’t due process for any of us. With this logic, any of us, including American citizens, could be treated in a similar way.

So thank you for joining us for this special and, indeed, somber episode.