Washington (AP) – The Trump administration invokes the “privilege of state secrets” in an apparent attempt to avoid answering questions from the judge on his erroneous deportation of Kilmar Abrego Garcia in El Salvador.
US District Judge Paula Xinis revealed the government’s position in a two -page order on Wednesday. It set a deadline on Monday so that lawyers lay memories on the issue and how it could affect the case of Abrego Garcia. Xinis also planned an audience of May 16 in Greenbelt, Maryland, to tackle the issue.
The republican administration previously invoked the same legal authority to cut the investigation of a judge to find out if he has challenged an order to overthrow planes expelling Venezuelan migrants in El Salvador.
Abrego Garcia, 29, has been imprisoned in his native Salvador for almost two months. His erroneous expulsion has become a flash point for the immigration policies of President Donald Trump and his increasing friction with the American courts.
Trump said he could call El Salvador president and have Abrego Garcia, who lived in Maryland, returned to the United States. Instead, Trump has doubled his claims that Abrego Garcia is a member of the MS-13 gang.
Maryland police had identified Abrego Garcia as a member of the MS-13 gang in 2019 on the basis of his tattoos, the hooded sweatshirt of Chicago Bulls and the word of a criminal informant. But Abrego Garcia has never been charged. His lawyers say that the informant said that Greo Garcia was in an MS-13 chapter in New York, where Abrego Garcia never lived.
The administration fell by saying to Xinis what, if necessary, did to facilitate the return of Abrego Garcia to the United States, the judge judged that his lawyers could question several officials of the Trump administration under oath regarding the government’s response to his orders.
In a legal file on Wednesday, his lawyers declared that they had already made depositions of three officials and were “still in the dark” of the efforts of the government to release Abrego Garcia. They ask permission to file more officials, perhaps including one from the White House.
Originally published:
California Daily Newspapers
