Home Republican committee chairs are denying Democrats’ requests to journey to El Salvador and go to its CECOT jail facility as scrutiny builds on the Trump administration’s dealing with of Kilmar Abrego Garcia’s mistaken deportation.
Home Oversight and Authorities Reform Committee Chair James Comer (R-Ky.) and Home Homeland Safety Committee Chair Mark Inexperienced (R-Tenn.) this week denied requests from Democrats to make use of official committee funds for Congressional delegation — in any other case generally known as CODEL journeys — to El Salvador, with Comer calling the request “absurd” and Inexperienced saying it might “waste taxpayer dollars.”
The denials come as Sen. Chris Van Hollen (D-Md.) made a visit to the nation this week and met with Abrego Garcia, a Salvadoran nationwide who was dwelling in Maryland and whose return the Supreme Court docket has stated the Trump administration ought to facilitate.
However it additionally comes as Home Republicans are visiting El Salvador and the CECOT jail themselves. A number of Home GOP lawmakers, led by Home Methods and Means Committee Chair Jason Smith (R-Mo.), visited El Salvador and the CECOT jail this week.
Comer particularly denied a request that Reps. Robert Garcia (D-Calif.) and Maxwell Frost (D-Fla.) made earlier within the week to go to the jail and to “conduct a welfare check on Abrego Garcia” and others held there, along with different oversight.
“It is absurd that you both displayed active hostility for over two years toward the Committee’s oversight of the Biden Border Crisis and the consequences of millions of illegal aliens entering the country, yet now, you are seeking travel at Committee expense to meet with foreign gang members,” Comer stated in a letter denying the request Friday.
Comer claimed images confirmed Van Hollen “enjoying margaritas garnished with cherry slices with the foreign gang member.” Van Hollen stated in a press convention on Friday that an aide for El Salvador President Nayib Bukele had positioned the salt- or sugar-rimmed glasses on the desk and neither he nor Abrego Garcia “touched” the drinks. Claims of Abrego Garcia’s membership in MS-13 are primarily based largely on a confidential tip and disputed by him and his household.
“If you also wish to meet with him, you can spend your own money. But I will not approve a single dime of taxpayer funds for use on the excursion you have requested,” Comer advised Garcia and Frost. “Your request is denied.”
Garcia responded to Comer’s denial in a submit on the social platform X by saying it “won’t stop us from doing our jobs.”
“Let’s be clear, the Trump administration admitted the deportation was a mistake, they have presented no evidence he was in MS-13, and they are defying the Supreme Court,” Garcia stated.
Inexperienced additionally stated he would deny requests from Democrats to go to El Salvador.
“There is no excuse for Democrats to waste taxpayer dollars visiting and defending a transnational gang member and reported domestic abuser,” Inexperienced stated in an announcement on Thursday, in reference to Abrego Garcia’s spouse submitting for a protecting order towards him in 2021. “If Democrats care so much about defending this individual, they can use their own personal credit cards—not taxpayers’ money—to virtue-signal to their radical base.”
Inexperienced’s assertion got here after Rep. Delia Ramirez (D-Ailing.) had made a request for an official CODEL to El Salvador to conduct oversight over the Abrego Garcia case, as Axios reported.
Different Congressional Republicans, although, have clearly seen worth in conducting journeys to El Salvador and the CECOT jail.
Smith posted a couple of journey he made to El Salvador CECOT jail earlier within the week, together with images of detainees behind bars.
“Thanks to President Trump, the CECOT prison in El Salvador, which is home to some of the country’s most vicious criminals, now includes illegal immigrants who broke into our country and committed violent acts against Americans,” Smith stated within the submit. “It is unconscionable that Democrats in Congress are urging the release of more foreign criminals back into our country.”
Accompanying Smith in El Salvador was Rep. Riley Moore (R-W.Va.), who additionally posted images from the CECOT jail and stated the journey left him “even more determined to support President Trump’s efforts to secure our homeland.”
The U.S. Embassy in El Salvador shared a photograph on Wednesday with Smith, Moore, and Republican Reps. Kevin Hern (Okla.), Carol Miller (W.Va.), Claudia Tenney (N.Y.), Ron Estes (Kan.), and Rep. Mike Kennedy (Utah), saying the members visited “to strengthen bilateral ties and discuss initiatives that promote economic development and mutual cooperation.” It isn’t clear whether or not all the members visited the CECOT jail.
Up to date at 7:25 p.m. EDT
