President Trump's border czar Tom Homan criticized Sen. Chris Van Hollen (D-Md.) for flying to the El Salvador prison where a wrongfully deported man is being held, calling the trip “disgusting.”
Homan joined "Fox & Friends" on Wednesday morning, as Van Hollen landed in El Salvador to check on Kilmar Abrego Garcia’s well-being and to “hold constructive conversations with government officials around his release.”
“Rather than taking care of the constituents in his state, the victims of illegal crime in his state, he’s going to run to El Salvador to protect an MS-13 terrorist,” Homan said. “It’s just disgusting.”
Homan criticized Abrego Garcia, who grew up in El Salvador, and called him a MS-13 gang member. Abrego Garcia and his wife have both denied the allegations that he is part of a gang. He’s lived in the U.S. for more than a decade after fleeing El Salvador due to threats of violence against his life. An immigration court granted him approval to stay in the U.S.
The Supreme Court ruled that the Trump administration must “facilitate” Abrego Garcia’s return, but the administration has said it cannot push a foreign country to release someone. El Salvador’s President Nayib Bukele said he would not help return Abrego Garcia when he visited the White House earlier this week.
Van Hollen said he is making the trip to see his constituent and will work to bring him back to the U.S.
“He was illegally abducted and needs to come home,” the senator said in a video from El Salvador on Wednesday.
The White House has insisted that the deportation was “always going to be the end result,” and if he were to return, he could be deported again.
Homan expressed frustration with the Democrats who are working to get Abrego Garcia home and pointed to the deaths of U.S. women at the hands of violent immigrants. He previously said it was the “right decision” to deport the Maryland man.
“I’m just as disgusted that any congressional representative is going to run through El Salvador to his aid when yesterday, I read in his state, an illegal alien charged with murder was released back into the community,” Homan said.
The murder Homan was referencing was that of Maryland woman Rachel Morin. In contrast to what the the administration official said, the Salvadoran man was convicted on Monday.
A federal judge on Tuesday ordered Trump officials to deliver depositions over the deportation after the administration failed to secure Abrego Garcia’s release.