Abrego Garcia’s lawyers say they’re ‘still in the dark’ about government’s efforts to facilitate his return
Sen. Van Hollen’s Office via Getty Images
(WASHINGTON) — Attorneys for wrongly deported Kilmar Abrego Garcia said in a court filing Thursday that after conducting three depositions, they are “still in the dark about the Government’s efforts to facilitate Abrego Garcia’s release from custody and return to the United States.”
U.S. District Judge Paula Xinis, seeking to determine how the government has failed to return Abrego Garcia after he was mistakenly deported to El Salvador, last month ordered expedited discovery in the case which included the depositions of the four government officials who submitted status updates on Abrego Garcia to the court.
In their filing on Thursday, attorneys for Abrego Garcia asked Judge Xinis to authorize three additional depositions of officials from the Department of Homeland Security, the U.S. Department of State, and the Department of Justice.
“As the Court stated in that Order, “discovery is necessary in light of Defendants’ uniform refusal to disclose ‘what it can’ regarding their facilitation of Abrego Garcia’s release and return to the status quo ante,” the lawyers wrote.
The motion comes a day after Judge Xinis, in a court order, said that the Trump administration had invoked the rarely used state secrets privilege to shield information about the case, and scheduled a May 16 hearing on the matter.
Abrego Garcia, a Salvadoran native who has been living with his wife and children in Maryland, was deported in March to El Salvador’s CECOT mega-prison — despite a 2019 court order barring his deportation to that country due to fear of persecution — after the Trump administration claimed he was a member of the criminal gang MS-13. His wife and attorneys deny that he is an MS-13 member.
The Trump administration, while acknowledging that Abrego Garcia was deported to El Salvador in error, has said that his alleged MS-13 affiliation makes him ineligible to return to the United States.
“Garcia is a citizen of El Salvador and should never have been in this country and will not be coming back to this country,” Department of Homeland Security Kristi Noem said Thursday in an appearance at a budget hearing before the Senate Appropriations Committee.
“There is no scenario where Garcia will be in the United States again. If he were to come back, we would immediately deport him again,” Noem said.
Astrid Riecken For The Washington Post via Getty Images
(WASHINGTON) — Fifteen minutes before a scheduled hearing in wrongful deportation case of Kilmar Abrego Garcia, the Trump administration said in their daily status report to the court that it is “prepared to facilitate Abrego Garcia’s presence in the United States in accordance with those processes if he presents at a port of entry.”
“I have been authorized to represent that DHS is prepared to facilitate Abrego Garcia’s presence in the United states in accordance with those processes if he presents at a port of entry,” said Joseph Mazarra, the Acting General Counsel for DHS.
However, Mazarra said, since Abrego Garcia is “being held in the sovereign, domestic custody” of El Salvador, DHS does not have the authority to forcibly extract him “from the domestic custody of a foreign sovereign nation.”
If Abrego Garcia does present at a port of entry, he would become subject to detention by DHS, due to his alleged membership in the criminal gang MS-13, said Mazarra.
The development came a day after a highly anticipated Oval Office meeting in which the president of El Salvador said he would not return Abrego Garcia to the United States.
The federal judge who ordered his return is scheduled to hear from Trump administration attorneys at a court hearing Tuesday afternoon.
Kilmar Abrego Garcia is entering his second month in an El Salvador mega-prison after he was deported there on March 15 despite being issued a 2019 court order barring his deportation to that country.
Trump administration officials say Abrego Garcia, who escaped political violence in El Salvador 2011, is a member of the criminal gang MS-13, but to date they have provided little evidence of that assertion in court.
He is being held in El Salvador’s notorious CECOT prison, along with hundreds of other alleged migrant gang members, under an arrangement in which the Trump administration is paying El Salvador $6 million to house migrants deported from the United States as part of President Donald Trump’s immigration crackdown.
Attorney General Pam Bondi, in an Oval Office meeting Monday with President Trump and the visiting El Salvador president, said that Abrego Garcia’s return is “up to El Salvador.”
“If El Salvador … wanted to return him, we would facilitate it,” she said.
Asked by reporters about Abrego Garcia, President Bukele responded, “I don’t have the power to return him to the United States.”
In a motion filed Tuesday in advance of the hearing, lawyers for Abrego Garcia argued that the Trump administration has not taken any steps to comply with the orders to facilitate his release.
“There is no evidence that anyone has requested the release of Abrego Garcia,” they wrote in the filing.
The attorneys also took issue with the government’s interpretation of the word “facilitate,” which the administration has argued in court filings is limited to removing any domestic obstacles that would impede the return of Abrego Garcia to the United States.
Interpreting the term in that manner, Abrego Garcia’s attorneys argued, would render “null” the Supreme Court’s order that the government facilitate his release.
“To give any meaning to the Supreme Court’s order, the Government should at least be required to request the release of Abrego Garcia. To date, the Government has not done so,” they wrote in their motion.
After U.S. District Judge Paula Xinis ordered the government to “facilitate and effectuate” Abrego Garcia’s return, the Supreme Court last week unanimously ruled that Judge Xinis “properly requires the Government to ‘facilitate’ Abrego Garcia’s release from custody in El Salvador and to ensure that his case is handled as it would have been had he not been improperly sent to El Salvador.”
“The intended scope of the term ‘effectuate’ in the District Court’s order is, however, unclear, and may exceed the District Court’s authority. The District Court should clarify its directive, with due regard for the deference owed to the Executive Branch in the conduct of foreign affairs,” the Supreme Court wrote, which the Trump administration has interpreted as prohibiting the district court from ordering the executive branch to take any action that would violate the separation of powers.
Judge Xinis subsequently amended her ruling to remove the word “effectuate,” leaving the order to “facilitate.”
In an interview Monday evening with ABC News’ Linsey Davis, an attorney for Abrego Garcia said he hopes Tuesday’s hearing “lights a fire under the government to comply with the Supreme Court’s order” to facilitate Abrego Garcia’s release.
“What we’re asking [of Trump] is exactly what the Supreme Court told him,” attorney Benjamin Osorio said. “I personally have worked with DHS before to facilitate the return of several other clients who were deported and then won their cases at circuit court levels or at the Supreme Court, and ICE facilitated their return.”
“So we’re not asking anybody to do anything illegal,” Osorio said. “We’re asking them to follow the law.”
“It feels a little bit like the Spider-Man meme where everybody’s pointing at everybody else,” Osorio said of Bukele’s claim that he doesn’t have the power to return Garcia. “But at the same time, I mean, we are renting space from the Salvadorans. We are paying them to house these individuals, so we could stop payment and allow them to be returned to us.”
Asked if he is confident that Abrego Garcia will be returned, Osorio said he was concerned but hopeful.
“I’m worried about the rule of law, I’m worried about our Constitution, I’m worrying about due process,” he said. “So at this point, I am optimistic to see what happens in the federal court hearing.”
(HONOLULU) — Hawaii has passed legislation to increase people staying at hotels to help the islands cope with the increasing pressures from climate change.
The bill, SB1396, adds a 0.75% levy to existing taxes on tourist lodging within the state — including hotels rooms, timeshares and vacation rentals starting Jan. 1, 2026. It also imposes an 11% tax on cruise ship bills for each night the ship is in a Hawaiian port.
The new legislation is expected to raise nearly $100 million a year, and will be used for environmental protection and defenses against natural disasters amplified by climate change, including rising sea levels, coastal erosion and shifts in rainfall patterns. The state sees up to 10 million visitors per year, according to the Hawaii Tourism Authority.
Among the projects needed on the island are coral reef protections and clearing invasive grasses that can fuel wildfires.
The new tax will be added to the existing 10.25% tax Hawaii imposes on short-term rentals, raising the total to 11%. In addition, counties in Hawaii charge a separate 3% lodging tax. Travelers also pay a 4.712% general excise tax that applies to virtually all goods and services.
Come Jan. 1, the state’s total tax on short-term rentals will climb to 18.712%.
The bill passed by a large margin in the state’s House and Senate. Gov. Josh Green also supports the bill and intends to sign it, according to a statement released on Friday.
It represents “a generational commitment” to protect the ‘āina — a Hawaiian word that mean “land” but also signifies the deep connection between people and the environment — Green said. It is also the nation’s first statewide tax on lodging meant specifically to address the impacts of climate change, Green said.
“Hawai’i is truly setting a new standard to address the climate crisis, and I want to thank lawmakers for their unrelenting work these past two years in bringing this to fruition,” Green said.
Green told The Associated Press that he predicts visitors will be willing to pay taxes that help to protect the environment.
Care for ‘Āina Now, a local environmental advocacy group, estimates a $560 million gap for environmental stewardship on the Hawaiian islands.
A higher tax increase was initially proposed but was pared down after legislators heard concerns from the travel industry, AP reported.
The governor has until July 9 to sign the bill into law.
Gerard Bottino/SOPA Images/LightRocket via Getty Images
(WASHINGTON) — Another Navy fighter jet sank to the bottom of the Red Sea on Tuesday following the second such mishap aboard the USS Harry S. Truman aircraft carrier in just over a week, a U.S. official told ABC News.
The F/A-18 F fighter jet was attempting a nighttime landing onto the deck of the carrier when the crew was unable to stop it in time before going off the side, according to the official. When the “failed arrestment” of the aircraft became apparent, the two pilots ejected.
Both of the pilots were recovered and early indications are that they suffered minor injuries, the official said. No other injuries were reported.
The incident happened at 8:45 p.m. local time in the Red Sea, according to the official. It was not immediately unclear what led to the failed arrestment during the landing.
The incident is the fourth major mishap involving the carrier since it deployed last year, including when another F/A-18 jet fell off the side of the Truman just eight days ago. That jet was being towed in the hangar bay when the crew lost control of the aircraft, which then tumbled off the side along with the tow truck.
An investigation into the April 28 incident remains underway. F/A-18 jets cost some $70 million each.
In February, the Truman collided with a large merchant vessel in the vicinity of Port Said, Egypt, in the Mediterranean Sea. That incident followed an accidental shootdown of another F/A-18 late last year by one of the surface ships belonging to the Truman strike group.
The Truman has been operating in the Red Sea since last year when it was deployed to help protect commercial ships against near-constant attacks by Houthi rebels in Yemen.
The carrier was slated to come home last month, but Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth extended its deployment while ordering another carrier — the USS Carl Vinson — to the region to bolster military power.
President Donald Trump announced Tuesday that the U.S. would stop bombing the Houthis because the rebel group had agreed to stand down. A senior Houthi official said the group was not immediately agreeing to a U.S.-proposed ceasefire, saying they had to evaluate it first.
