Democrats rallying around illegal immigrant KIlmar Abrego Garcia are facing a narrative reckoning as allegations of violent and criminal behavior mount against the man they made a poster child in the fight against President Trump’s mass deportations.
In recent weeks, evidence has emerged that Abrego Garcia beat his wife and was caught trafficking migrants during his time living illegally in Maryland. He has since been deported to El Salvador, where several Democrats, including Maryland Sen. Chris Van Hollen, have rushed to meet with him and decry what they say was a lack of due process extended to him.
“The fact that they went to the mat for this guy just shows exactly who they are,” Department of Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem said on “Fox & Friends Weekend” on Saturday. “That they are people who don’t put America first. They don’t care about our citizens and protecting our communities. So, I’m glad that the onion’s been peeled back and that their true motivations have been revealed, and this is just one of the cases that we’re getting off the streets.”
Van Hollen has led the surge of Democrats traveling to El Salvador since April, after Abrego Garcia was deported to the country in March and sent to its notoriously high-security prison equipped to handle violent gang members, known as CECOT. The Trump administration has repeatedly cited court and police documents showing that the El Salvadoran man was not only in the U.S. illegally, but also connected to the MS-13 gang and that his wife had sounded the alarm to police about his violence.
ABREGO GARCIA’S WIFE BEGGED JUDGE FOR PROTECTION ORDER, SAYING ‘HE SLAPPED ME’: AUDIO
Democrats and the media had characterized Abrego Garcia as a “family man” and a “Maryland man” who was wrongly deported back in March and the following weeks.
Van Hollen met last month with Abrego Garcia and advocated for his release, declaring that the deportation risks “the constitutional rights of everyone who resides in the United States of America.” Van Hollen’s trip sparked other left-wing lawmakers to also make the trip south, including Reps. Yassamin Ansari of Arizona, Maxine Dexter of Oregon, Maxwell Frost of Florida and Robert Garcia of California last month. At one point, Dexter pledged to remain in El Salvador until Abrego Garcia was brought back to the U.S.
But Democrats have gone largely silent amid a flood of newly unearthed evidence against Abrego Garcia.
Fox News Digital exclusively reported on Thursday that new court records show Abrego Garcia’s wife, Jennifer Vasquez Sura, filed a protective order against her husband in August of 2020. The order said their shared son and stepchildren needed protection from Abrego Garcia, accusing him of verbal and physical abuse against her and mental abuse against her children.
The protection form described an incident in November 2019 when Abrego Garcia allegedly grabbed Vasquez Sura “by the hair in the car,” “dragged” her “out of car and left [her] in the street.” She wrote that he also “broke” her son’s tablet, “broke doors” in the house, pushed her against a wall, broke a phone and a television and damaged the walls that spring.
TENNESSEE BODYCAM OF ‘MARYLAND MAN’ TRAFFIC STOP SHOWS TROOPERS’ HANDS TIED DESPITE SMUGGLING CLUES
Audio recordings allegedly of Vasquez Sura asking for the protection order in 2020 have also surfaced.
“On Wednesday, he hit me, like around like, three in the morning, he would just wake up and like, hit me,” Vasquez Sura told the court in the recordings, Fox Digital previously reported.
Vasquez Sura said that while she was trying to escape Abrego Garcia, she saw a neighbor walking their dog and screamed “help.” Vasquez Sura said Abrego Garcia then “grabbed me from my hair, and then he slapped me.”
Vasquez Sura asked for the petition to be rescinded, however, saying her family wanted to take part in their son’s birthday, and Abrego Garcia “also agreed to continue counseling and if not [he’s] willing to sign divorce papers.”
The 2020 protective order is the second publicly-known order filed against Abrego Garcia. Vasquez Sura filed a separate protective request against her husband in 2021, accusing him of repeatedly hitting her.
“At this point, I am afraid to be close to him. I have multiple photos/videos of how violent he can be and all the bruises he [has] left me,” she told a Prince George’s County, Maryland, court, Fox Digital previously reported.
“In November 2020, he hit me with his work boot,” she added of the alleged attacks. “In August 2020, he hit me in the eye leaving a purple eye.”
His wife, however, has since publicly defended him and addressed the domestic violence allegations following the revelation of the first protective order request.
“After surviving domestic violence in a previous relationship, I acted out of caution following a disagreement with Kilmar by seeking a civil protective order, in case things escalated. Things did not escalate, and I decided not to follow through with the civil court process. We were able to work through the situation privately as a family, including by going to counseling,” she said in a statement last month.
The Trump administration and conservatives have come out in full force condemning Democrats for supporting an illegal immigrant accused of gang ties, human trafficking and domestic violence. Trump designated violent gangs such as MS-13 and Tre de Aragua as terrorist organizations in his second administration.
“I think it’s bizarre that you see these Democrat politicians making a pilgrimage down there … to sit there with this guy, because I never have seen those Democrat politicians meet with angel moms who’ve lost kids because of illegal alien crime,” Republican Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis said on Fox News last week.
MARYLAND GOVERNOR SAYS HE WON’T TRAVEL TO EL SALVADOR FOR ABREGO GARCIA
“This is a person that was a clear and present danger to the safety of the American people. And it is … a sad reflection on the state of our media and many of the outlets represented in this room that you obsessively try to shill for this MS-13 terrorist. Well, no coverage occurred in your papers about any of the Americans that were raped and tortured and murdered by the illegals that Biden was importing into our country,” White House deputy chief of staff Stephen Miller said during a White House press briefing on Thursday.
Democrats have amplified the argument that the Trump administration has thwarted Abrego Garcia’s right to due process amid the mounting evidence that the so-called “Maryland Man” was wrongfully deported.
California Sen. Alex Padilla told CNN last week that Democrats are more focused on Abrego Garcia’s due process and ensuring he receives a fair court battle, and not on the individual.
“I think our advocacy here has a little bit less to do with him individually and more the process,” Padilla said. “The lack of due process that this administration continues to act with. The laws are clear in this country, even if you are undocumented, you have the right to due process.”
House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries allegedly called on Democrats last week to slow their visits to and comments regarding El Salvador, though his office vehemently denied he made such a request to colleagues, saying “House Democrats will never stop fighting for the release of Mr. Abrego Garcia.”
Fox News Digital reached out to Jeffries’ and Padilla’s offices for comment on Sunday regarding the ongoing condemnation from conservatives and the Trump administration over Democrats advocating on behalf of Abrego Garcia and Padilla’s comments outlining how the party is working to protect due process, but did not immediately receive replies.
DEPORTED ‘MARYLAND MAN’ CHAMPIONED BY DEMS WAS PULLED OVER DRIVING CAR BELONGING TO HUMAN SMUGGLER
While Democratic Minnesota Rep. Ilhan Omar told a Daily Caller reporter last week, “I think you should f— off” when asked whether she believed that more Democrats should travel to El Salvador to advocate for Abrego Garcia.
Abrego Garcia entered the U.S. illegally from his home country of El Salvador in 2011 and was issued a deportation order in 2019, Fox News Digital previously reported.
Abrego Garcia was suspected of partaking in labor/human trafficking, according to a 2022 Homeland Security Investigations report previously obtained by Fox News. The report also stated that “official law enforcement investigations” revealed that Abrego Garcia was a member of the notorious gang MS-13, which Trump has designated as a terror organization.
Abrego Garcia was pulled over by a Tennessee Highway Patrol trooper on Dec. 1, 2022, after he spotted the car speeding and not remaining in its lane, according to the Homeland Security Investigations report.
The trooper noticed eight individuals in the car with Abrego Garcia, who said he had begun driving three days prior from Houston to Temple Hills, Maryland, via St. Louis to “perform construction work,” Fox Digital previously reported. The report states that the trooper suspected the group was involved with a human trafficking incident, as there was no luggage in the vehicle.
Documents further revealed that Abrego Garcia was driving a black 2001 Chevrolet Suburban that he said belonged to his “boss.” The Suburban was identified by the Department of Homeland Security as belonging to Hernandez Reyes, who pleaded guilty to human smuggling after being caught in Mississippi in a car with passengers from Mexico, El Salvador and Honduras, Fox Digital previously reported.
Body camera video, obtained by Fox News Digital through a public records request last week, showed the Tennessee Highway Patrol troopers pulling over Abrego Garcia, who had eight other individuals in his car.
“How many rows have you got in here? Four seats? Four rows of seats?” a state trooper can be heard saying in the video. “Did y’all put an extra one in? Huh? Did yall put another one in no? They come like this I’ve never seen one with that many seats in it.”
Abrego Garcia’s legal team responded to the new bodycam footage in a comment to Fox Digital on Sunday, saying it did not constitute evidence of a crime.
“I have represented Kilmar Abrego Garcia for more than a month, and this bodycam video is the first time I’ve heard his voice. He has been denied the most basic protections of due process—no phone call to his lawyer, no call to his wife or child, and no opportunity to be heard,” Simon Sandoval-Moshenberg, the lead attorney for the case.
“As an attorney, I see no evidence of a crime in this footage. But the point is not the traffic stop—it’s that Mr. Abrego Garcia deserves his day in court. Bring him back to the United States, return him before the same immigration judge who heard his case in 2019, and let him speak for himself,” Sandoval-Moshenberg continued.
“He’s hauling these people for money,” one state trooper said.
The Homeland Security Investigations report also notes that in October 2019, the Prince Georges County Police Gang Unit identified Abrego Garcia as a member of MS-13.
NEW AUDIO REVEALS ABREGO GARCIA’S ALLEGED ABUSE OF HIS WIFE
The deportation has been wrapped up in court proceedings since March, with a Maryland federal judge ordering the Department of Justice to “take all available steps to facilitate” his return to the U.S., which was a ruling upheld by an appeals court and the U.S. Supreme Court.
The Trump administration, however, contends that it “cannot guarantee success in sensitive international negotiations” with El Salvador to secure the release.
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“The United States does not control the sovereign nation of El Salvador, nor can it compel El Salvador to follow a federal judge’s bidding,” Solicitor General John Sauer wrote in the Trump administration’s Supreme Court petition last month, the New York Post reported.
Fox News’ Stepheny Price, Peter Pinedo, Michael Dorgan and Adam Sabes contributed to this report.
