Today’s declaration answers only the first of Judge Xinis’s required three questions: it updates the court on Abrego Garcia’s location and status but omits any mentions of steps, past or future, to retrieve him.
— Joshua J. Friedman (@joshuajfriedman.com) April 12, 2025 at 5:28 PM
Today’s declaration answers only the first of Judge Xinis’s required three questions: it updates the court on Abrego Garcia’s location and status but omits any mentions of steps, past or future, to retrieve him.
— Joshua J. Friedman (@joshuajfriedman.com) April 12, 2025 at 5:28 PM
By using the phrase “pursuant to the sovereign, domestic authority of El Salvador,” the Trump administration continues to insist that it has no direct control over Kilmar Abrego Garcia’s captivity.
(But IMO it’s too early to conclude that the govt will never take any steps to return him.)
— Joshua J. Friedman (@joshuajfriedman.com) April 12, 2025 at 5:34 PM
BellyCat
(FYI: Crazy formatting issues AL…)
Jackie
Could you repeat it in English? ;D
Jay
Wow, that’s a mess.
Atticus Dogsbody
I couldn’t have said it better myself.
japa21
Well, as far as I can tell, the government did update the court on Garcia’s location, but that was all. Apparently still insisting they can’t do anything. So at least they are responding. And the whole sovereignty of El Salvador they are talking about is a complete joke. Everybody knows if Trump asked, not even demand, he be released, he would be.
mvr
I can’t read it either. I see lots of HTML codes in case knowing that is helpful.
Jay
So, basically, in response to the Courts questions, the DumpDOJ answered one, yes, he’s alive, DOGEshitted the other two, and say’s the US can’t make El Salvador do anything.
Ocotillo
Even the good news is messed up.
Sally
It is funny how impotent this current president is.
me
Again, the judge needs to freeze all payments to El Salvador until he’s returned. See how much they want to keep him.
Martin
I take this as a cosmetic cover, but that’s about it. We’ve had a number of things today showing Trump has turned down the temperature a bit. So they responded to the judge in terms of acknowledging his location and proof-of-life, but still contend he is out of reach as though El Salvador is holding him hostage and not that they’re holding him because we paid them to.
So less openly defiant but still holding those middle fingers up pretty high. I’ll take even a small acknowledgement of the validity of the courts right now. Yesterday it was pretty apparent there wasn’t any, so I wonder if some other Republicans let Trump know there would be consequences to completely ignoring USSC.
Chetan Murthy
Chetan Murthy
[trying]
Chetan Murthy
Chetan Murthy
I pasted into the comment box, in the text tab, then switched to visual to read it. But oddly I can’t post that as a comment. Sorry oh well.
Elizabelle
@Sally:
That is the perfect way to look at it. Impotent. And whiny.
Jay
Basically a F/U to the courts, with no consequences.
Scout211
Here’s NBC
Added
Harrison Wesley
I didn’t know they use Bluesky on Alpha Centauri.
BellyCat
Show cause or…. what? Herein lies the problem.
japa21
@Scout211:
What BS. He is detained pursuant to an illegal arrest and deportation by the US government, facilitated by a payment to El Salvador.
Downpuppy
The absolute minimum should be an order that NOBODY gets sent to El Salvador until they’ve established a quick & reliable mechanism for returning mistaken detainees.
That there should be 100% return & no further turnovers is really the only thing remotely just, but that’s not going to get done by these courts.
Scout211
Also too, in the NBC article:
That’s President Bukele of El Salvador and Trump.
Timill
Stripping the HTML I get:
WaterGirl
All better now! :-)
Thanks to Jackie for letting me know about this.
BellyCat
Barring any payments to El Salvador not yet made might be a lever for the court.
ETA: “Me” got there already!
Andrya
The Supreme Court has basically said that the Trump administration has to ask the El Salvador government to return Mr. Abrego Garcia, but it’s OK if they can’t/won’t make it happen. I am absolutely sure that the government lawyer is going to say “We asked! We asked ‘pretty please with sugar on it’! But those darn El Salvadorians said ‘no’, so there’s nothing to be done!”
The Trump regime is working to establish a police state where everyone is so afraid of terrifying extra-legal punishment that no one will dare to oppose them on anything. So, they cannot afford have a path in the legal system for anyone to escape their claws.
And Trump is now talking about sending prisoners from US prisons to an overseas gulag- which, if he gets away with it, would involve sending American citizens.
In 1832, the Andrew Jackson administration lost a case in the Supreme Court, Jackson refused to defer to the Court. (Although he may not actually have said “John Marshall has made his decision, now let him enforce it”.) This exposed a weakness in the American constitutional system: if a runaway president defies the courts, and the Congress fails to rein the president in, the president can become a de facto dictator. That’s what we are looking at now.
Scout211
@WaterGirl: Thank you WaterGirl and Jackie!
Aziz, light!
@Scout211:
“That’s President Bukele of El Salvador and
TrumpPresident Bukkake of the United States.”Fixed that for you.
YY_Sima Qian
Since this is an open thread, worth remembering that, despite Trump’s 2nd cave in the past week, nearly 80% of the PRC’s exports to the U.S. still face the 145% tariff. The 20% exempted in the latest cave still faces a 20% additional “fentanyl” levy imposed before last week. The PRC’s retaliatory tariffs & export controls remain in place. On top of everything else (the 10% global tariff, the 25% on steel/aluminum, & the 25% on CAN/MEX imports that are not covered under USMCA, which is the majority of the intra-North American trade), the U.S. still faces a supply shock epic proportions, & shortages w/in weeks. Unless Trump caves some more.
Kelly
Abrego Garcia is in the sovereign control of El Salvador. There’s nothing to be done because the US has always respected the sovereignty of all Central and South American nations.
WaterGirl
@Kelly: Surely you jest!
MoCaAce
If the US government deports a person, that persons country is responsible for them. If the US Government incarcerates a person they remain the responsibility of the US government. In this case El Salvador is nothing but a private prison contractor. If the US is going to argue they have no control over a man they incarcerated and rendered then this is human trafficking.
Kelly
@WaterGirl: ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
Timill
The court orders you to go the San Salvador and obtain Senor Abrigo Garcia’s release. To return to the US, both of you will go to the US Embassy and give the code word “Klptzyxm” whereupon you will be returned.
Fail in this at your peril…
Scout211
@Kelly: You forgot, “And don’t call me Shirley!”
She gave you the pitch right there over the plate, too.
WTFGhost
@Jay: This is getting embarrassingly close to a situation where the SCOTUS will rule, appropriately, that bringing a lawless executive to account is *not* the role of the judiciary.
I mean, “embarrassingly” like, “it’s all but deliberate, Trump wants to say only the Republican Congress can hold him to account, and get the SCOTUS to agree.”
Then they can vanish anyone they want, so long as they’re sufficiently unpopular, and Trump can get them over the border fast enough.
I’ve heard Trump also wants to declare the border a military base – just hearsay – but it sounds like they want to disappear spying illegals caught on our military bases!!!1!!1!!11!!!elventy!1
Using certain legal herbal remedies gives me a stark detachment to admire the sheer, unmitigated, gall it takes to be that evil.
I mean, it reeks of Hitler’s Permanent Solution (“Gee, all these prisoners, but… no food, blankets, medical supplies…?”) and, look. Let’s agree, hypothetically, if a For Real, “We are der Fuhrer’s master race!” Nazi were in front of you, you are excused for having an urge to punch them, really hard.
I’m not the only one who feels the urge to punch a lot of people, not, you know, *real* people, but, hypothetical for-real Nazis, am I? And, I mean, one of the person’s I’m almost ready to punch is me because maybe I coulda shoulda, even though I know I worked to be alive here, and saying “this is full blown Nazi shit.”
Kelly
@Scout211: You’re right I definitely whiffed a fat pitch
eclare
@WTFGhost:
Didn’t SCOTUS already rule that way last summer? It ruled that a president cannot be prosecuted for official actions.
Harrison Wesley
@Aziz, light!: Ah, that most sinister of the martial arts……
Gretchen
Garcia’ s lawyers asked the judge to hold the government lawyers in contempt.
Andrya
@eclare: Judge Xinis repeatedly asked who in the executive branch had refused to turn the planes around when she so ordered. (The government lawyer said that he didn’t know.) That sounded like she was considering holding lower level executive branch officials in contempt of court.
MisterForkbeard
@eclare: Refusing to follow court mandated orders is pretty explicitly not an official action – it’s the exact opposite of his job.
But I’m sure the Court will find another reason Trump can’t be held to basic standards
Gretchen
There are reports that Trump wants to deport a million immigrants – a nice round number. There are nothing like a million illegal immigrants here – they’ll be going after citizens too. Kristi Noem did a tweet saying Khalil had no right to be here if he didn’t respect American values, and a lot of the responses were that his (American citizen wife and baby) should get kicked out too.
WTFGhost
@eclare: Well, normally, if someone simply refuses to obey a court order, they go straight to jail, and possibly pay fines, etc.. But, the judiciary can’t do that to the President. So, they get to punt, saying “we agree this is unlawful, and call upon Congress to decide how to act.”
It’s just… there’s nothing saying they have to. And they don’t have to run any investigations, while letting Trump cover up his crimes with impunity, and they get to do this to our country for far, far, too long, before we even have a chance to make them stop.
eclare
@Andrya:
Good.
Sally
@Elizabelle: I try to think of ways of saying things that will offend him the most
Sally
@YY_Sima Qian: Unless trump is bribed some more.
Sally
We are back in this circle of senate (McConnell) refusing to convict the convict because “it’s up to the voters”. The voters say, “it’s up to the courts to disqualify him”. The courts say “it’s up to the congress to impeach him”. Then the Senate says “it’s up to the voters, or the courts”. The courts say “it’s up to the voters, or the congress”. And the voters say ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
tobie
@Gretchen: We have 77 million people who voted for this. 55% of Americans according to NBC’s latest poll approve of Trump’s immigration policies. I said in an earlier thread that our problems are deeper than oligarchy. It’s the 60 million Americans who embrace and celebrate authoritarianism.
WeimarGerman
Are folks familiar with en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_v._Shipp ?
Shipp was a sheriff in TN whose jail held Ed Johnson accused of raping a white woman. He was convicted after a sham trial but word got to SCOTUS who issued a retrial. After Shipp was notified of the retrial he and his jailers opened the jail to a lynch mob who murdered Johnson.
Why the fuck hasn’t everyone involved been thrown in jail until Garcia is back with his family? It’s simple contempt of court.