The wife of Kilmar Armando Abrego Garcia, the Maryland man who was deported to El Salvador in error, denied the Trump administration’s allegation that her husband is a member of the criminal gang MS-13.
“He’s never been convicted for anything,” Jennifer Vasquez told ABC News Live Prime on Wednesday.
“Everything they are saying is wrong,” she said. “My husband is a loving father and what I know is that he’s an amazing husband, an amazing father. That’s who he truly is.”
Abrego Garcia — despite having protected legal status preventing his deportation to El Salvador, where he escaped political violence in 2011 — was sent to that country’s notorious CECOT mega-prison following what the government said was an “administrative error.”
Vasquez said she found out her husband was in El Salvador after she saw photos in the local Salvadoran news.
“It was heartbreaking,” she said. “Lots of tears, confused.”
Last month, Abrego Garcia, whose wife is a U.S. citizen and who has 5-year-old child, was stopped by ICE officers who “informed him that his immigration status had changed,” according to his attorneys. He was detained and then transferred to a detention center in Texas, after which he was sent on March 15 to El Salvador along with more than 200 Venezuelan men who the government claims are gang members.
White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt, while acknowledging the error in sending Abrego Garcia to El Salvador, said last week that he was unwelcome in the U.S.
“The administration maintains the position that this individual who was deported to El Salvador and will not be returning to our country was a member of the brutal and vicious MS-13 gang,” Leavitt said.
Vasquez told ABC News that she is trying to be strong.
“My youngest son is autistic and he’s nonverbal, but I’ve seen that he misses him a lot,” Vasquez said. “He looks for him, he looks for his work shirts just to smell him.”
Vasquez said that one of the hardest things is not knowing her husband’s condition.
“My biggest question is, when is he coming home?” Vasquez said. “Is he OK? And I don’t think anyone can answer that right now.”
U.S. District Judge Paula Xinis ordered the Trump administration to return Abrego Garcia from El Salvador by this past Monday at midnight, before Supreme Court Chief Justice John Roberts on Monday issued a temporary administrative stay delaying the midnight deadline in order to give the court more time to consider the arguments presented by both sides.
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