The Trump administration conceded in a court filing Wednesday that it had deported a Maryland father to the notorious Terrorism Confinement Center (CECOT) in El Salvador as a result of an "administrative error," The Atlantic first reported. But now that he's in foreign custody, officials claim, they cannot be compelled to do anything to bring him back.
The father and Salvadoran national, Kilmar Armando Abrego Garcia, was granted protected status by an immigration judge in 2019 after ICE officials tried to deport him. At the time, ICE had claimed that he was a high-ranking member of MS-13, a Salvadoran criminal gang. Garcia disputed those charges and appealed for asylum over fears that he would be killed or tortured by gang members targeting him for extortion.
