A Maryland senator visits his wrongfully deported constituent in El Salvador

Updated April 17, 2025 at 18:14 PM ET

Sen. Chris Van Hollen met with Kilmar Abrego Garcia — the Maryland man illegally deported by the Trump administration — in El Salvador on Thursday.

On social media, Van Hollen posted a photo of himself and Abrego Garcia sitting at a table.

"I said my main goal of this trip was to meet with Kilmar," Van Hollen wrote on X. "Tonight I had that chance. I have called his wife, Jennifer, to pass along his message of love."

Salvadoran President Nayib Bukele was the first to post photos and announce the meeting on X.

"Now that he's been confirmed healthy, he gets the honor of staying in El Salvador's custody," Bukele said of Abrego Garcia in a repost of his photos.

The face-to-face meeting comes after Van Hollen said he was denied access to Abrego Garcia twice. On Wednesday, Salvadoran Vice President Félix Ulloa told the senator he couldn't meet or call Abrego Garcia. And in a Thursday interview on All Things Considered, Van Hollen said that he was stopped by soldiers while on his way to CECOT, the notorious mega-prison where Abrego Garcia is being held.

"They simply said they had been given orders to not allow me to visit him," he said.

It remains unclear how the the senator and Abrego Garcia were able to meet in El Salvador, but Van Hollen said he'd give a "full update" when he returns to the U.S. on Friday.

Abrego Garcia's wife, Jennifer Vasquez Sura, released a statement following the meeting.

"My children and my prayers have been answered … because I now know that my husband is alive," she said. "We still have so many questions, hopes, and fears."

Abrego Garcia, 29, is a Salvadoran citizen who lived and worked in Maryland for about 15 years. He was wrongly deported to El Salvador last month — despite the fact that he was granted protections by a judge years earlier over concerns for his safety if he were to return there.

The Supreme Court has since ruled that the Trump administration must facilitate Abrego Garcia's return to the U.S., an order it has so far ignored. And at a White House meeting on Monday, El Salvador's president, Nayib Bukele, declined to return him, calling the suggestion "preposterous."

The situation galvanized Van Hollen, to personally campaign for Abrego Garcia.

The U.S. has accused Abrego Garcia of being a member of the transnational criminal gang MS-13, which the Trump administration designated a Foreign Terrorist Organization. Abrego Garcia's lawyers dispute that he is a member of the gang, and say he doesn't have a criminal record.

After meeting with El Salvador's vice president, Félix Ulloa, Van Hollen told reporters on Wednesday that El Salvador's government doesn't have evidence that Abrego Garcia was involved in the gang.

Van Hollen told All Things Considered that, according to Ulloa, Abrego Garcia remains in custody because "El Salvador was being paid by the Trump administration, by the government of the United States, and that this was essentially their obligation, their contractual obligation."

"I pointed out that El Salvador is a sovereign country, and they really shouldn't be complicit in this illegal detention of Abrego Garcia," he said.

Earlier on Wednesday, Van Hollen told reporters while he wanted to see Abrego Garcia in person and report back to his family, Ulloa told him he would have needed to make earlier arrangements to visit the facility.

"I said, 'I'm not interested in this moment in taking a tour of CECOT. I just want to meet with Mr. Abrego Garcia,' " Van Hollen said. "He said he needed a little bit more time. I asked him if I came back next week whether I'd be able to see Mr. Abrego Garcia. He said he couldn't promise that either."

Van Hollen said Ulloa could not arrange a phone or video call with Abrego Garcia, but told him the American embassy might be able to. The senator said he plans to ask the embassy to do so, as he continues the fight for Abrego Garcia's return.

He told All Things Considered that he plans to continue draw attention to Abrego Garcia's case "until he gets his full due process."

White House slams Van Hollen's visit

On the same day Van Hollen lobbied El Salvador to return Abrego Garcia to the U.S., the White House doubled down on its case against him.

"If he ever ends up back in the United States he would immediately be deported again," White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt said from the podium. "Nothing will change the fact that Abrego Garcia will never be a Maryland father, he will never live in the United States of America again."

She accused Van Hollen of "potentially using taxpayer dollars" to fund his trip and slammed Democrats for supporting Abrego Garcia's release instead of efforts to improve border security, which she said would make Americans safer.

Leavitt was joined at the press briefing by Maryland resident Patty Morin, whose daughter Rachel was raped and murdered in 2023 by a fugitive from El Salvador, Victor Martinez-Hernandez, 24, who was convicted of the crime on Monday. Morin also spoke critically of Van Hollen.

"To have a senator from Maryland who didn't even acknowledge, or barely acknowledge, my daughter and the brutal death that she endured, leaving her five children without a mother … so that he can use my taxpayer money to fly to El Salvador to bring back someone that's not even an American citizen?" she said.

Van Hollen's office released a statement about the conviction in the case on Monday, thanking those who made the verdict possible. He said the country can improve public safety and border security "while also supporting our immigrant communities and respecting the rights of individuals who are here legally."

Other lawmakers are mulling El Salvador visits 

Van Hollen isn't the only member of Congress to visit El Salvador recently.

Two Republicans, West Virginia Rep. Riley Moore and Missouri Rep. Jason Smith, posted photos to social media of themselves touring CECOT on Tuesday. They each spoke highly of Trump's deportation agenda, with Moore saying he leaves "even more determined" to support the president's efforts.

"It is unconscionable that Democrats in Congress are urging the release of more foreign criminals back into our country," Smith tweeted.

Several House Democrats also hope to make the same trip — and the opposite argument.

In two separate letters this week, Reps. Robert Garcia of California, Maxwell Frost of Florida and Delia Ramirez of Illinois, asked the chair of the House Oversight Committee, Rep. James Comer, R-Ky., to authorize a Congressional Member Delegation to visit CECOT.

Garcia and Frost wrote that a "Congressional delegation would allow Committee Members to conduct a welfare check on Mr. Abrego Garcia, as well as others held at CECOT."

"In addition, congressional oversight is warranted following President Trump's recent remarks in which he expressed a desire to send 'homegrown criminals' — including U.S. citizens — to this facility," they said, adding that they would gladly include Republicans on their trip and are prepared to leave as soon as possible.

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