US Congress members visit El Salvador to facilitate release of deported man

(Reuters) - Four Democratic U.S. representatives arrived in El Salvador on Monday hoping to compel the Trump administration to release Kilmar Abrego Garcia, a Salvadoran man mistakenly deported and now held in a notorious prison in that country.

U.S. Representatives Maxwell Frost of Florida, Robert Garcia of California, Yassamin Ansari of Arizona and Maxine Dexter of Oregon are in El Salvador to facilitate Garcia's return to the United States, they said in a statement.

"Donald Trump and his administration are running a government-funded kidnapping program – illegally arresting, jailing, and deporting innocent people with zero due process," Frost said in the statement.

The U.S. government sent Abrego Garcia, 29, to El Salvador on March 15 despite an order protecting him from deportation to El Salvador. Abrego Garcia left El Salvador at age 16 to escape gang-related violence, his lawyers said. He has never been charged with or convicted of any crime.

The U.S. Supreme Court directed the Trump administration to facilitate Abrego Garcia's return, after Washington acknowledged he was deported to El Salvador due to an administrative error. The Trump administration says Abrego Garcia belongs to the criminal gang MS-13, but his lawyers have denied the allegation.

White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt defended the administration's actions in an interview with Fox News on Monday.

Asked if the administration made a mistake sending Abrego Garcia to El Salvador, she said: "We did not make a mistake. We have always maintained that this was an individual who needed to be deported from our country."

Last week, Chris Van Hollen, the U.S. senator from Maryland, where Abrego Garcia lived, went to El Salvador and met with Abrego Garcia, also calling for his release.



(Reporting by Brendan O'Brien in Chicago; editing by Doina Chiacu)