Wife of Maryland father who was 'accidentally' deported by Trump administration speaks out for first time
After the Trump administration 'mistakenly' deported her husband to El Salvador earlier this year, the wife of Kilmar Armando Abrego Garcia has released a devastating statement.
A national of the South American country, Abrego Garcia fled hostility at home over a decade ago, starting a new life in the United States.
He was granted protected status by an immigration judge in 2019 - prohibiting the government from sending him back - and has since moved to Maryland, where he met and married Jennifer Vasquez Sura, an American citizen.
The two are also parents to their five-year-old disabled son.
Advert
Back in March, however, Abrego Garcia - who works full time as a union sheetmetal apprentice - was suddenly arrested by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) 'due to his prominent role in MS-13'.
This refers to an international criminal gang, originally set up in the 80s in a bid to protect Salvadoran immigrants from Los Angeles criminals.
Several weeks later, Abrego Garcia's wife identified him in a photograph of detainees entering intake at El Salvador's Terrorism Confinement Center (CECOT) - the country's notorious maximum security prison - confirming he'd been deported.
Constructed in 2022, the facility was purposed in a bid to crackdown on gang violence in South America.
Despite Abrego Garcia's attorney, Simon Sandoval-Moshenberg, insisting that the devoted father is not a member of - nor has any ties to - the gang in question, Trump's team insisted that there's nothing they can do to bring him home.
In a court ruling filed earlier this week, (31 March), representatives were forced to hold their hands up his accidental incarceration, putting the mistake down to an 'administrative error'.
Following the ruling, Abrego Garcia's wife Sura has spoken out, admitting she and her son are 'very scared' about his safety.
"I've seen news of that prison, and I know they take criminals there," she told CBS News. "And my husband’s not a criminal."
Reflecting on the moment, she realised her husband had been removed from a US detention centre and flown overseas after failing to receive a phone call from him for several days.
"He never called," Sura continued. "I waited and waited. He never made that call."
"When I saw it [the photo of him at the facility], I immediately broke down ‘cause I knew it was him. I was scared for his life."
The mother-of-one went on to implore: "He’s not a criminal. My husband is an amazing person. An amazing father." she said.
Robert Cerna, an acting ICE field office director, claimed in the filings that Abrego Garcia's deportation was an 'oversight' - as per The Atlantic.
"Abrego-Garcia was not on the initial manifest of the Title 8 flight to be removed to El Salvador. Rather, he was an alternate," he claimed.
"As others were removed from the flight for various reasons, he moved up the list and was assigned to the flight. The manifest did not indicate that Abrego-Garcia should not be removed."
The Justice Department also said that they couldn't help in bringing Abrego Garcia - who has no criminal record in the US, his attorney says - back to the States, being that he's now being held in Salvadoran custody.
The attorneys for the Trump administration went on to advise the court to dismiss the return request on multiple grounds, claiming Trump's 'primacy in foreign affairs' outweighs the case in question.
"They claim that the court is powerless to order any relief," Sandoval-Moshenberg told press.
"If that’s true, the immigration laws are meaningless - all of them - because the government can deport whoever they want, wherever they want, whenever they want, and no court can do anything about it once it’s done."
Topics: Politics, Donald Trump, US News, News, World News
Rhianna Benson