Sen. Chris Van Hollen held a news conference a day after Salvadoran officials agreed to let him meet with Abrego Garcia in El Salvador.
Sen. Chris Van Hollen, D-Md., revealed new details about his meeting this week with Kilmar Abrego Garcia, including that he had been traumatized by his imprisonment in El Salvador.
Van Hollen met with Abrego Garcia — a Maryland man who the Trump administration says was mistakenly deported last month — on Thursday after his previous efforts to meet with him were denied by Salvadoran officials.
The Maryland senator held a news conference at Washington Dulles International Airport on Friday upon his return from El Salvador, where he told reporters that he met with Abrego Garcia for more than 30 minutes and informed him of the national attention on his case, which the senator said Abrego Garcia was unaware of.
While Van Hollen has hinted at more trips to El Salvador by congressional Democrats, the party has been divided about how best to respond to Abrego Garcia’s case. Some high-profile Democrats have opted to keep the focus on the economic backlash to Trump’s sweeping tariffs, which polling suggests is much more of a political liability to the president than his ongoing efforts to deport immigrants.
Cowards of which nothing better is expected.
Can we not walk and chew gum at the same time? for Christ’s sake
Walk and chew gum yes, anyone can do. From what I’ve seen of democrats, however, it seems they’re limited to walk-and-talk, or talk-and-talk.
The senator said Abrego Garcia told him he was no longer being housed at CECOT, a terrorism confinement center, and had been transferred more than week ago to another detention center in Santa Ana, El Salvador, “where the conditions are better.”
“But he said despite the better conditions, he still has no access to any news from the outside world and no ability to communicate with anybody in the outside world,” Van Hollen said.
Abrego Garcia told Van Hollen that thinking of members of his family “gave him the strength to persevere,” the senator said, adding that the Maryland man spoke several times about his 5-year-old son, who has autism and was in the car with him when he was detained, the senator said.
