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What to Know About the Deportation of Kilmar Armando Abrego Garcia to El Salvador

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What to Know About the Deportation of Kilmar Armando Abrego Garcia to El Salvador

Some of President Trump’s top aides on Monday misstated several key facts involving the deportation of a Maryland man to El Salvador last month, blatantly contradicting other members of the administration who have maintained for weeks that his expulsion was an “administrative error.”

In remarks from the Oval Office and on television, Mr. Trump’s advisers suddenly declared that the man, Kilmar Armando Abrego Garcia, had been lawfully sent to a prison in El Salvador.

The White House also sought to portray a recent Supreme Court ruling in Mr. Abrego Garcia’s case as a victory when in fact the decision was a nuanced one. It partly found in favor of Mr. Abrego Garcia while also leaving open a loophole for the administration to avoid bringing him back from El Salvador.

The efforts by the Trump administration to misrepresent the case came as President Nayib Bukele of El Salvador announced after a meeting with Mr. Trump that his government would not return Mr. Abrego Garcia to U.S. soil.

Here are some of the ways in which the White House has twisted the facts.

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When Mr. Abrego Garcia, a Salvadoran immigrant, was arrested while looking for work at a Home Depot in Maryland in 2019, a judge determined that he should not be deported to his homeland because he might face danger there. The ruling, known as a “withholding from removal” order, meant that he could stay in the United States with a measure of legal protection.

In March, however, he was suddenly pulled over by federal agents who accused him of being a member of the Salvadoran gang MS-13 and inaccurately told him that his protected status in the country had changed. Within three days, he was on a plane with other migrants to a prison in El Salvador called CECOT, which is known for its human rights violations.

After Mr. Abrego Garcia’s family sued the government seeking his return, several Trump administration officials — including the United States solicitor general — made a rare admission: The White House had made a mistake when it deported Mr. Abrego Garcia.

But on Monday, Stephen Miller, Mr. Trump’s top domestic policy adviser, abruptly changed course. He declared on Fox News that Mr. Abrego Garcia had not in fact been wrongfully deported.

“He was not mistakenly sent to El Salvador,” Mr. Miller said, adding, “This was the right person sent to the right place.”

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The sudden turnabout was remarkable not only because Mr. Miller, who is not a lawyer, contradicted previous assertions by some within the administration, but also because he appeared to go against the findings of the Supreme Court. In their recent ruling in Mr. Abrego Garcia’s case, the justices immediately stated that the government itself had taken the position that “the removal to El Salvador was the result of an ‘administrative error.’”

That view had already been advanced in court papers by a top official at U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement and by D. John Sauer, Mr. Trump’s newly appointed solicitor general. It was also offered during a court hearing this month by Erez Reuveni, a Justice Department lawyer who was handling the case — that is, until he was fired this weekend, according to a person familiar with the matter.

In one of the more remarkable moments in his appearance on Fox News, Mr. Miller blamed Mr. Reuveni — and only Mr. Reuveni — for having planted the idea that Mr. Abrego Garcia’s deportation had been in error.

“A D.O.J. lawyer who has since been relieved of duty, a saboteur, a Democrat, put into a filing, incorrectly, that this was a mistaken removal,” Mr. Miller said.

That assertion, however, flew in the face of the fact that other Trump officials had said the exact same thing.

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One of them was Mr. Sauer, a top-ranking Justice Department official. Another was Robert Cerna, the acting field office director for enforcement and removal operations at ICE.

Early in the case, Mr. Cerna submitted a sworn declaration about Mr. Abrego Garcia’s deportation, and made clear that it was a mistake.

“This removal was an error,” he said.

Moreover, just a few weeks before he was fired, Mr. Reuveni was praised as a “top-notched” prosecutor by his superiors in an email announcing a recent promotion.

Mr. Trump and his top aides have repeatedly accused Mr. Abrego Garcia of being a member of MS-13. They have also said at times that he is a terrorist — but only because the administration recently designated MS-13 as a terrorist organization.

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In the Oval Office on Monday, Attorney General Pam Bondi said that two courts — an immigration court and an appellate court — had “ruled” that Mr. Abrego Garcia was a member of MS-13. But Ms. Bondi’s statement was a bit misleading.

To be clear, Mr. Abrego Garcia has never been charged with — let alone convicted of — being a member of the gang. But during his deportation proceedings, some evidence was introduced that he belonged to MS-13, and judges decided it was enough to keep him in custody while the matter was resolved.

But other judges have found the same evidence to be lacking.

When Judge Paula Xinis, who has been overseeing the efforts to bring Mr. Abrego Garcia back to the United States, considered the accusations that he was a gang member, she decided they were less than persuasive.

“The ‘evidence’ against Abrego Garcia consisted of nothing more than his Chicago Bulls hat and hoodie, and a vague, uncorroborated allegation from a confidential informant claiming he belonged to MS-13’s ‘Western’ clique in New York — a place he has never lived,” Judge Xinis wrote in an order last week.

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In its daily update to Judge Xinis outlining what steps it has taken to return Mr. Abrego Garcia to the United States, the Justice Department, submitting its filing more than an hour late, echoed many of the recalcitrant remarks that administration officials made in the Oval Office. It included the assertion that in 2019, a judge had determined that Mr. Abrego Garcia was a member of MS-13.

When the Supreme Court handed down its ruling in Mr. Abrego Garcia’s case last week, its findings were complicated and rather ambiguous.

The justices endorsed Judge Xinis’s previous order that required the administration to “facilitate” the return of Mr. Abrego Garcia. But they stopped short of actually ordering his return, indicating that even federal courts may not have the authority to require the executive branch to do so.

And yet Mr. Miller, in his appearance on Fox News and in the Oval Office, portrayed the ruling as an unmitigated victory for the Trump administration.

He said, for instance, that the Supreme Court’s instructions that the White House had to “facilitate” getting Mr. Abrego Garcia out of custody meant that Trump officials could assume an entirely passive stance toward his release.

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“If El Salvador voluntarily sends him back,” Mr. Miller said on Fox News, “we wouldn’t block him at the airport.”

But whether that position flies with Judge Xinis remains to be seen. She has scheduled a hearing to discuss what the government should do for Tuesday in Federal District Court in Maryland.

Mr. Miller also seized upon a small portion of the justices’ ruling that directed Judge Xinis to take the first crack at telling the White House what to do. The justices cautioned Judge Xinis that as she considered that issue, her ultimate decision needed to be made “with due regard for the deference owed to the executive branch in the conduct of foreign affairs.”

The Justice Department used that line in a court filing on Sunday to suggest that the courts were powerless to dictate how the White House should act because the president alone has broad powers to handle foreign policy.

“The federal courts have no authority to direct the executive branch to conduct foreign relations in a particular way, or engage with a foreign sovereign in a given manner,” lawyers for the department wrote. “That is the ‘exclusive power of the president as the sole organ of the federal government in the field of international relations.’”

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Glenn Thrush contributed reporting.

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Video: 12 Dead in Missouri Skydiving Plane Crash

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Video: 12 Dead in Missouri Skydiving Plane Crash

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12 Dead in Missouri Skydiving Plane Crash

Eleven passengers and a pilot were killed shortly after taking off for a skydiving trip in Missouri on Sunday.

We’re still trying to identify family and make notifications. And so we’re going to be respectful of that. There were witnesses that were family members, yes.

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Eleven passengers and a pilot were killed shortly after taking off for a skydiving trip in Missouri on Sunday.

By Cynthia Silva

June 14, 2026

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Fate of historic slavery exhibit targeted by Trump hangs in the balance

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Fate of historic slavery exhibit targeted by Trump hangs in the balance

Attorney and tour guide Raina Yancey wants the federal government to fully restore a slavery exhibit taken down months ago at the President’s House in Philadelphia.

Adrian Florido


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Adrian Florido

President Trump’s fight to reshape how American history is told has hit another hurdle.

Last week, a federal judge temporarily blocked his year-old executive order titled “Restoring Truth and Sanity to American History.” It ordered the Interior Secretary to remove from national parks and historic sites content that “inappropriately disparages Americans past or living.”

Months later, federal employees took crowbars and peeled away an exhibit about nine African-Americans President George Washington had enslaved at the nation’s first executive mansion in Philadelphia.

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The removal sparked bipartisan condemnation and a separate lengthy legal battle that has wound its way to a federal court of appeals.

Some of the exhibit has since been restored, but a lot is still missing.

Lawyer and activist Michael Coard spent years fighting to create a site telling the stories of the people enslaved by George Washington in Philadelphia.

Lawyer and activist Michael Coard spent years fighting to create a site telling the stories of the people enslaved by George Washington in Philadelphia.

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Henry Larson

Michael Coard is a lawyer and activist who advocated for the exhibit’s creation. It opened in 2010.

“It was the grand opening of the first slave memorial of its kind on federal property in the history of the U.S. We thought it would last forever. But 15 years later, the destruction came,” Coard said.

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He and others want the full exhibit restored by the Fourth of July, when people will descend on historic Philadelphia to celebrate the 250th anniversary of the nation’s founding.

NPR’s Adrian Florido spoke with Coard, attorney and tour guide Raina Yancey and others at the President’s House in Philadelphia to understand the deadline pressure activists now face, and how they’re still telling the story of Washington’s enslaved workers as the legal battle wages on.

Listen to the full story by clicking the blue play button above.

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Trump endorses Collins in Georgia Senate runoff. It’s his latest ‘MAGA’ pick in Republican primaries

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Trump endorses Collins in Georgia Senate runoff. It’s his latest ‘MAGA’ pick in Republican primaries

ATLANTA (AP) — Days before the U.S. Senate runoff in Georgia, President Donald Trump has endorsed U.S. Rep. Mike Collins over former football coach Derek Dooley, putting his stamp of approval on another loyalist who some conservatives believe could be a risky bet in November.

The Republican candidates are competing Tuesday for the chance to take on Democratic Sen. Jon Ossoff in one of the most closely watched campaigns in the November midterm elections. Collins has positioned himself as a stalwart ally of Trump and his “Make America Great Again” movement, and the president said in his announcement early Sunday on social media that the trucking company owner and second-term congressman “has been with me from the very beginning” and is a ”true friend, fighter, and WARRIOR.”

Dooley, a political newcomer, is backed by outgoing Gov. Brian Kemp, who has clashed with Trump in the past. “I don’t know Derek Dooley, and neither does anyone else, but he seems like a nice person,” Trump wrote, while noting that Dooley did not vote in 2016 or 2020, when Trump was on the ballot. Dooley has acknowledged going nearly two decades without voting but says he did vote for Trump in 2024.

Collins led Dooley in the May 19 primary but neither surpassed 40%, leaving many Republican votes up for grabs. Trump’s endorsement has proved powerful as he shapes a party identity that is increasingly indistinguishable from his own.

“Everybody knows that I do best with the MAGA base,” Collins said on primary night. “It’s because they know I’ve always been with President Trump.”

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Still, the president’s choice puts him at odds with more traditional Republicans, including Kemp. The endorsement is reminiscent of Trump’s decision to back Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton before his victory over U.S. Sen. John Cornyn in the state’s recent primary runoff.

Dooley responded to Trump’s decision by saying Georgia voters want “a political outsider” rather than “typical D.C. politicians like Mike Collins.” In an X post, Dooley expressed confidence that he would win.

Collins has embraced Trump since his first campaign for Congress in 2022, and he has echoed the president’s false claims that his 2020 defeat to Democrat Joe Biden was fraudulent. Collins sponsored the Laken Riley Act, a 2025 law that requires immigrants be detained when charged with certain crimes. Republicans believe the issue damages Ossoff because he initially voted against the measure before supporting it after Trump returned to the White House.

Dooley — and Kemp as his top surrogate — argue that a first-time candidate has a better shot to defeat Ossoff, the only Democratic senator facing voters in a state Trump carried in 2024.

Kemp, who once drew Trump’s ire for refusing to help overturn Biden’s victory, was the top choice of Senate Republican leaders looking for an Ossoff challenger. Kemp recruited Dooley, a childhood friend, to run instead.

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The governor points to a trio of first-term Republican senators — Montana’s Tim Sheehy, Pennsylvania’s Dave McCormick and Ohio’s Bernie Moreno — who defeated Democratic incumbents in 2024 running as outsiders who still aligned with the president.

Dooley’s argument is matched against Trump’s winning streak inside the party. In a matter of weeks, Trump has celebrated victories over Republicans who did not pass his test of loyalty.

Cornyn lost to Paxton, U.S. Rep. Thomas Massie of Kentucky lost to Ed Gallrein, U.S. Sen. Bill Cassidy of Louisiana failed to make a runoff and several Indiana state senators were defeated by challengers.

Dooley has told voters he will “work with President Trump but fight for you.” He also emphasizes that Republicans have not won a U.S. Senate race in Georgia since 2016.

Collins walks no such tightrope, and he still insists that he can have wider appeal in the fall.

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“You don’t beat Jon Ossoff by having no record,” he said. “You win by having a record of results.”

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