U.S. Senator Van Hollen says he met wrongly deported man in El Salvador

Maryland Sen. Chris Van Hollen, right, speaks with Kilmar Abrego Garcia, a Salvadoran citizen who was living in Maryland and deported to El Salvador by the Trump administration, in a hotel restaurant in San Salvador, El Salvador, Thursday, April 17, 2025.
| Photo Credit: AP

Democratic U.S. Senator Chris Van Hollen said on Thursday (April 17, 2025) said he met Kilmar Abrego Garcia, a man wrongly deported to El Salvador by the administration of Republican President Donald Trump.

The senator posted an image of himself with Abrego Garcia on the social media platform X.

“I said my main goal of this trip (to El Salvador) was to meet with Kilmar. Tonight I had that chance. I have called his wife, Jennifer, to pass along his message of love. I look forward to providing a full update upon my return,” the senator wrote in his post.

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On Wednesday, Van Hollen said authorities in El Salvador had denied him access to Abrego Garcia, who has been held in a notorious prison for gang members.

Van Hollen, the senior senator from Maryland where Abrego Garcia lived, arrived in El Salvador on Wednesday to meet with senior officials and advocate for Abrego Garcia’s release, but was told by El Salvador’s Vice President Felix Ulloa that he could not authorize a visit or a call with Abrego Garcia.

It was not immediately clear what changed that allowed the Senator access.

Salvadoran President Nayib Bukele, who said in a White House meeting with Mr. Trump on Monday that he had no intention of releasing Abrego Garcia, also posted pictures of the encounter with Van Hollen on social media.

“Kilmar Abrego Garcia, miraculously risen from the ‘death camps’ & ‘torture’, now sipping margaritas with Sen. Van Hollen in the tropical paradise of El Salvador!” Bukele said in an apparently sarcastic remark on X.

Bukele posted pictures of Van Hollen, Abrego Garcia and a third, unidentified man. There appeared to be glasses of water and other clear beverages on the table.

A representative of Abrego Garcia did not immediately respond to a request for comment on the meeting with the U.S. senator.