"Homegrown Criminals Are Next"

     So there Orange Julius Caesar sat in front of his newly-gilded fireplace in the Oval Office, playing the Lard of the Manor for a tinpot dictator named Nayib Bukele of El Salvador. Bukele is the very delineation of a banana republic strongman that Trump openly admires, the type of strongman that he aspires to be.

      The conversation inevitably turned to Kilmar Abrego García, the El Salvadoran immigrant who was illegally arrested and extraordinarily renditioned to El Salvador's infamous gulag, CECOT. Trump categorically refused to allow any serious discussion of letting Mr. Garcia go because Trump still clung to the lie that he was a criminal, a terrorist and a member of MS13.

     In point of fact. Mr. Garcia does not have a criminal record, had not been charged with a crime and there isn't a shred of evidence to even suggest that he belongs to MS13 or any gang. It's a fact-free allegation that the Trump administration manufactured to cover up a fuck up or a clear, knowing violation of Garcia's civil rights. The allegations are ironic in a way because Garcia and his family were granted protected status back in the first Trump administration when he succeeded in convincing the State Department that they were in danger of reprisals of gang activity in their native El Salvador.

     After Garcia was kidnapped and renditioned back to his native country in handcuffs, ankle and waist chains, it was appealed and a lower court, presided over by federal judge Paula Xinis, ordered Garcia returned back to the United States. The Trump junta ignored her, even going as far as to say that since Garcia was in El Salvador, she no longer had jurisdiction over the matter.

     Just days after that, Garcia's case was brought before the Supreme Court and, in a stunning reversal, the court ruled 9-0 against Trump and also ordered that Garcia be returned.

     During that Oval Office dog and pony show, Stephen Miller was present and delivered a jaw-dropping monologue on how the high court actually sided with the Trump administration when anyone with a working eye and ear could see that the court unanimously ruled against it.

     For his part, Bukakke said, “How can I return him to the United States? I smuggle him into the United States? Of course I’m not going to do it.” He knows damned good and well he wouldn't have to "smuggle" Garcia back into the country.

 

 

      Then Trump added a truly dystopian twist to the whole thing by asking Bukele to build five more prisons like CECOT. (CECOT has a 40,000 bed capacity), meaning Trump's planning on deporting at least 200,000 to El Salvador. He mentioned "homegrown criminals" (like him, for instance), sending the irony and projection meters off the charts.

     The deal that Trump's criminal operation had struck with Bukele's CECOT gulag is so secret, not a word of it has been released to anyone, which alone shows you what a scummy, illegal deal it was from the start. It's been accused of countless human rights abuses and the inmates there are not given the chance for rehabilitation. There are no books, no visitors are allowed, and the inmates are kept behind bars for literally 23.5 hours a day. They're not even allowed to go outside.

     Essentially, it's a giant roach motel. You check in but you can't check out. When you're sent there, you're sent there to die.

     As proof that this is a black prison site, Maryland Sen. Chris Van Hollen recently went to San Salvador to see about effecting Garcia's release. Not only was he unable to talk to Garcia directly, he wasn't even allowed to talk to him over the phone. In fact, he was turned away from the prison. In short, he was given no proof that Garcia was even still alive.

     At this point, it doesn't even matter if the Trump administration made an honest mistake (as if such a thing is possible with this criminal enterprise) or deliberately railroaded an innocent man who was allowed to live here legally and given a work permit. What makes this so blatantly evil is that the Trump administration still insists on selling it, as if violating legal migrants' and American citizens' rights will somehow make America Great Again.

     Keep in mind that Trump is planning on having a big Soviet-style parade, something the Pentagon wouldn't allow him the last time. This will be on April 20th (coincidentally, or not, Hitler's birthday), the day universally acknowledged will be the day Trump announces an invocation of the Insurrection Act, which is the only federal law on the books that legally bypasses Posse Comitatus.

     People, this is not a question of whether or not we're in a Constitutional crisis. We are in one. Trump is thumbing his nose at one federal judge after another and now he's doing it to the Supreme Court itself. He's preparing to deport hundreds of thousands of legal migrants and even American citizens for expressing opinions he simply doesn't like.

     This is not how a president is supposed to act, this is not supposed to be how a democracy acts. Abrego Garcia was not given any due process whatsoever. Nor will any of us if and when we get ensnared in Trump's insane, paranoid dragnet.