Current courtroom filings recommend the Trump administration “misled federal judges, Congress, and the American folks” a couple of deal between the U.S. and El Salvador to detain over 200 Venezuelan migrants on the infamous mega-prison known as CECOT, 4 Democratic rating members of Home committees mentioned in a letter.
The letter, reviewed by ABC Information, was despatched Thursday to Division of Homeland Safety Secretary Kristi Noem and Secretary of State Marco Rubio, and calls on officers to show over any and all agreements between the U.S. and El Salvador, which haven’t been made public.
The letter cites courtroom filings that appear to contradict the administration’s contention that migrants despatched to the jail are solely below the jurisdiction of the federal government of El Salvador.
Jail officers take away handcuffs from a prisoner to enter a cell at most safety penitentiary CECOT (Middle for the Obligatory Housing of Terrorism) on April 4, 2025 in Tecoluca, San Vicente, El Salvador. Amid inside authorized dispute, Trump’s administration continues with its controversial and fast-paced deportation coverage to El Salvador, as a part of a partnership with President Bukele.
Photograph by Alex Peña/Getty Photographs
In keeping with these filings, submitted July 7 in a case difficult the removing of Venezuelan migrants from the U.S., the federal government of El Salvador advised a United Nations working group that the boys in CECOT deported from the U.S. stay the “obligation” of the US.
“On this context, the jurisdiction and obligation for these individuals lie completely with the competent international authorities, by advantage of worldwide agreements signed and in accordance with the ideas of sovereignty and worldwide cooperation in felony issues,” El Salvador officers mentioned in a report back to the U.N.
Of their letter, the rating members mentioned the submitting “signifies that the Division of Justice has misled federal courts in assertions relating to the settlement with El Salvador.”
ABC Information has reached out to DHS and the State Division for touch upon the letter.
The Trump administration has insisted for months that it’s unable to return any of the migrants despatched to CECOT as a result of they’re below El Salvador’s authority.
In March, the Trump administration invoked the Alien Enemies Act, a wartime authority, to deport two planeloads of alleged Venezuelan gang members to El Salvador as a part of a $6 million deal the administration struck with El Salvador President Nayib Bukele to deal with migrant detainees as a part of Trump’s immigration crackdown.
The Trump administration argued that the boys who have been deported are members of Tren de Aragua which the federal government has deemed a international terrorist group and a “hybrid felony state” that’s invading the nation.
Nevertheless, one ICE official said in a sworn declaration submitted in federal court that most of the noncitizens who have been deported didn’t have felony information in the US as a result of “they’ve solely been in the US for a brief time period.”
U.S. Consultant Jamie Raskin (D-MD) speaks to the media after the U.S. Home of Representatives voted to move U.S. President Donald Trump’s sweeping spending and tax invoice, on Capitol Hill in Washington, D.C., U.S., July 3, 2025.
Ken Cedeno/Reuters
The Democrats’ letter additionally highlighted reporting by The New York Occasions that mentioned the deal between the U.S. and Bukele, additionally included an settlement to return some prime leaders of the MS-13 gang who allegedly had data of a “corrupt cut price” between Bukele and the gang “that has performed a big position within the lower in gang violence in El Salvador.” ABC Information has not independently confirmed that reporting.
Along with the U.S.-El Salvador settlement, the lawmakers are asking the Trump administration to offer details about the way it screens migrants with legitimate asylum claims or withholding of removing orders, and Conference In opposition to Torture safety claims earlier than they’re faraway from the nation.
“Congress has the appropriate and the duty to conduct oversight over the chief department and decide what offers our authorities has struck with a international dictator to imprison people seized in the US in an effort to position them past the reaches of our courts,” they wrote.
The signers of the letter have been Reps. Jamie Raskin, of Maryland; Bennie Thompson, of Mississippi; Robert Garcia, of California; and Gregory Meeks, of New York.
