I have been thinking a lot lately about the case of Kilmar Abrego Garcia, a Maryland man who the Trump administration admits they wrongly deported in a round-up of supposed migrant gang members last month.
Why? Because how I feel about the Garcia case—as he remains in an El Salvadoran prison despite an apparent Supreme Court order urging the U.S. government to aid his return to America—is, well, divided.
And that divide speaks to a broader challenge I have grappled with for decades as a political journalist: What to do when what I believe to be right, morally, is not always what’s ‘right’ in the context of politics.
To be clear: I am not a lawyer. Or an expert on immigration policy.
But here’s what I know about Garcia: He came to the United States from El Salvador illegally in 2011—and said he fled because of threats made against his family by a gang. In 2019, an immigration judge said that he could not be returned to his home country. Garcia got a work visa, got married, had a kid. He has never been arrested.
(During a press briefing this week, White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt cited a “domestic violence restraining order” Garcia’s wife had filed against him in 2021; Garcia’s wife later clarified she did not follow through with any related court proceedings.)
Last month, Garcia was seized by ICE agents, however, and deported to a prison in El Salvador, along with more than 200 other people that the Trump administration said were members of the MS-13 gang.
There is no proof that Garcia is a member of that gang. He insists he is not. The Trump administration’s Solicitor General has acknowledged that Garcia’s deportation was a mistake, due to that 2019 legal ruling.
And yet, the Trump administration is now casting itself as powerless to bring him back to the United States—despite the ruling from the Supreme Court that most legal scholars interpreted as a direction to do just that.
El Salvadoran President Nayib Bukele, a Trumpian figure in his own country, insisted during an Oval Office meeting on Monday that he was also unable to return Garcia.
So, here’s the thing: Morally, to me, this is wrong. Period. If you admit you deported someone—without the chance for him to defend himself, have a lawyer etc.—on accident, you should be charged with getting him back.
To file a series of legal delay measures—which, to be clear, is what the Trump Department of Justice is doing—while this guy sits in a notoriously rough prison seems close to inhumane.
And to make the argument—as Trump’s domestic policy adviser Stephen Miller did this week—that there are dangerous illegal immigrants who commit crimes in Maryland in relation to Garcia’s circumstances is downright terrifying in its guilt-by-association implications.
With all of that said, I am not sure that making a massive issue out of the Garcia case is politically smart for Democrats.
Here’s why: The average person isn’t aware of every detail. They broadly agree with the sentiment that people here illegally should be returned to their country of origin. And they very much agree with the idea that if you are a) here illegally and b) affiliated with a violent gang, you should be removed from the United States.
The Trump administration is successfully muddying the waters here. They are going full tilt on the idea that Garcia is a bad person who right-thinking Americans want out of the country. If you think the U.S.—and, especially, the Biden administration—has been too lenient on illegal immigrants, you are very likely to conclude that, even if Garcia was wrongly deported, he’s no good guy and that Trump’s policy, in the main, is right.
So, politically speaking, my guess is that the Trump team likes the basic dynamic of this fight, which is that Democrats are pushing for a guy who came into the country illegally to be brought back to the U.S., while Trump is cracking down on people like him who never should have been in the country in the first place.
(After visiting El Salvador this week, Maryland Senator Chris Van Hollen was able to meet with Garcia at an undisclosed location, in a visit that was widely trolled by the Trump administration and right wing figures.)
Roll your eyes if you will—and I know many of you will!—but I am convinced that is the lens that a whole lot of the country sees this issue through.
I have often been criticized for “gamifying” politics in my career. Acting like all of this is just pieces on a chess board when, in fact, decisions made by our politicians have major real-life consequences.
I get that criticism. But I also have always viewed myself not as an advocate, but a clear-eyed pragmatist. And if the goal of a political party is to win elections—because in winning you obtain power and in obtaining power you can do what you believe to be right—then shouldn’t whether something works politically be of critical importance to your attention and resources?
Moral righteousness is all well and good. But moral righteousness and no political power doesn’t add up to much.
At the same time, a political system in which morality doesn’t matter—or is always taking a back seat to what makes most sense politically—doesn’t seem to me to be the sort of world I want to live in either.
So I don’t have a conclusion. Or a right answer. Or even a hot take. It’s a dilemma for me. And one that I have been trying to navigate for the better part of the last 30 years in this job.
Want more ball and strike calling—no matter what uniform the batter at the plate is wearing? Check out Chris Cillizza’s Substack and YouTube channel.
