How the Trump Administration Flipped on Kilmar Abrego Garcia

[Nevilledog]

https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2025/04/kilmar-abrego-garcia-plan-reversal/682594/

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https://archive.li/SZRPO

At each stage in the political and legal fight over Kilmar Abrego Garcia’s wrongful deportation, the Trump administration has pushed back harder and dug in deeper.

The administration first called Abrego Garcia’s deportation an “administrative error,” then a “clerical error.” The words trivialized the decision to send a man to a maximum-security prison in El Salvador without legal proceedings and in direct violation of a judge’s protective order. Officials insisted that the mistake could not be undone, disregarding a Supreme Court ruling instructing the administration to “facilitate” his return. Now the president and his advisers maintain, almost daily, that Abrego Garcia will never touch American soil again.

“He’s NOT coming back,” the White House has declared on social media, while repeatedly calling Abrego Garcia a dangerous criminal and a terrorist.

But in the days after the administration first discovered its mistake, instead of trying to foreclose Abrego Garcia’s return, officials looked for ways to bring him home. They puzzled over the fragmentary evidence tying him to gang membership. And they worried about his safety in a prison where he could be targeted for attack.

A lawsuit filed by Abrego Garcia’s family sparked urgent conversations among attorneys at the Departments of State, Justice, and Homeland Security who were involved in formulating the government’s response. Their discussion—which has not been previously reported—reflected serious concerns, at odds with the administration’s later statements, according to two people familiar with the conversations, as well as notes and memos I reviewed. Both people spoke with me on condition of anonymity to discuss a sensitive matter of ongoing litigation.

These conversations show that U.S. officials initially sought to resolve Abrego Garcia’s case quietly and ensure his safety through the conventional diplomatic channels they’ve used in other cases involving a mistaken deportation. This time, though, their efforts were abruptly halted.

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