(18 Apr 2025)
RESTRICTION SUMMARY:
ASSOCIATED PRESS
Dulles, Virginia – 18 April 2025
1. Sen. Chris Van Hollen walking to microphone, hugging Abrego Garcia’s family members
2. SOUNDBITE (English) Sen. Chris Van Hollen, (D) Maryland
"It’s good to be home. Now we need to end the illegal abduction of Kilmar Abrego Garcia and bring him home too. We’re joined by his wife, Jennifer, by his mother, by his brother, Cesar, and thank all of the rest of you who are joining us in solidarity with the Constitution and Kilmar. Look, I’m a little sleep deprived, and I want to be as clear as possible about what this is about and what it’s not about. So I’m going to read the remarks that I wrote on the plane ride home. As the federal courts have said, we need to bring Mr. Abrego Garcia home to protect his constitutional rights to due process. And it’s also important that people understand this case is not just about one man. It’s about protecting the constitutional rights of everybody who resides in the United States of America. If you deny the constitutional rights of one man, you threaten the constitutional rights and due process for everyone else in America. The Fourth Circuit put it very clearly in its strong opinion yesterday, 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, in this case the Trump administration, 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, 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 the courthouses still hold dear. They summed up the issue at stake perfectly. And that’s why the Supreme Court, in a nine-to-nothing decision, ordered the Trump administration to facilitate the return of Mr. Abrego Garcia. Now, the Trump administration wants to flat-out lie about what this case is about. They want to change the subject. They want make it about something else. And they are flouting the orders from the Federal District Court, the Fourth Circuit Court and the Supreme Court to facilitate his return."
++ENDS ON A SOUNDBITE++
STORYLINE:
Maryland Sen. Chris Van Hollen returned home from El Salvador after meeting with Kilmar Abrego Garcia, who was wrongly deported there by the Trump administration.
"As the federal courts have said, we need to bring Mr. Abrego Garcia home," Van Hollen said. "If you deny the constitutional rights of one man, you threaten the constitutional rights and due process for everyone else in America."
It’s unclear what will happen next in Abrego Garcia’s case. More Democrats have said they’ll fly to El Salvador to push for Abrego Garcia’s release, but the partisan pressure hasn’t yielded any results.
President Donald Trump and El Salvador’s President Nayib Bukele have dug in on keeping Abrego Garcia out of the U.S., even as officials in Trump’s Republican administration have called his deportation a mistake.
Van Hollen and other Democrats say the fight isn’t just about one man’s immigration status but about Trump’s defiance of courts that have weighed in on the case.
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