Had they just dropped him in a village in some Al-Shabab controlled hell-hole in Somalia we'd never even be hearing this story. The whole thing was an exercise in hubris for no apparent reason.
But now they can do what they always could have, send him anywhere else.
I am sorry to break it to you, but this happens all the time, and is not a violation of due process. You can find examples of many Presidents declaring opinions on the guilt or innocence of a variety of people before their trials. [1] It makes sense that this is allowed, as the Justice Department is a part of the Executive Branch, so all prosecutions are done with the tacit or explicit approval of the President. It would be more problematic if the judges in the case expressed views on guilt or innocence before hearing the case.
[1] https://www.commondreams.org/newswire/2011/04/25/obama-decla...
There's also an argument to be made for holding our political officers to a much higher standard than the general populace.
For one very obvious example, observe that it is illegal to notice an opium poppy is growing in a forest, then take and smoke it, and somehow that magically being interstate commerce.
At this point the government as we know it would totally collapse were it not the people willfully and deliberately violate the tenants of the constitutional republic we live under. And most of them, seem to agree with that.
MAGA voted for revolution, and they got Hillary Clinton (Trump's political idol since the 90s.) No matter who you vote for, you somehow get Hillary Clinton.
Everything that he is doing is what he said that he'd stop, except deportations of illegal aliens, attacks on public sector workers, and closing slush funds disguised as foreign aid, which his base (and others) very much support. The cutting of the public sector turned out to be a scam (barely anyone was cut, they were cut stupidly) and the slush funds were just shifted directly to the Pentagon; and although he closed the border, he was barely deporting. The Epstein failure, the Ukraine failure, and the Israel failure are also painfully obvious, and obviously things he could end at will (except he's obviously implicated by Epstein.)
So what he chose to do was to escalate the public show, the extravaganza of deportations. He tried to do it in the noisiest, most publicity aware way by picking fights with the most dingbat Democrats, creating alligator swamp prisons, and unleashing military in the streets of Democratic cities.
Since his backers (and every politician's backers) in the arms and oil industries want him to overthrow Venezuela, he's tried to somehow link what is overwhelmingly popular (the deportation of illegal aliens) with something stupid and unpopular (regime change in Venezuela) by talking about "illegal alien gang drug terrorists."
Ábrego García was a mistake that he got caught on, that he stupidly made a poster child for this PR strategy, and he's too dumb to let it go.
And to be fair, he sort of can't because it makes you wonder how many other mistakes there are, and then you can't give him the benefit of the doubt to push through the fast deportations he's trying to do to get around deliberately obstructionist judges.
Even worse, García is an illegal alien, and most people who voted for Trump want him deported anyway, no matter how nice he is. But Trump committed to painting immigrants as dangerous when statistically they're less dangerous than American natives. It's the second generation that become criminals, because they catch up to the US rate for people in their economic strata.
He could go back on that dumb claim, but it's not only been his brand since the first election, it's now tied to his excuse for continuing the siege of Venezuela, and escalating it to an outright attack. Also, the conquest of Venezuela would be a real legacy, because the US has become a country of thieves, and Venezuela has a lot to steal.
This is the real consideration. He doesn't care about immigration at all, which is why he isn't deporting, and isn't going after employers (who aren't Korean) but making exceptions and extolling H1Bs to MAGA rage. Attacking Venezuela is just going to lead to more Venezuelans coming in (and is why they're here now), and they'll just get a "legal" process that lets in just as many as the illegal process, in order to kill wages. Whoever you vote for, you get Hillary Clinton.
This isn't idiocy. A core pillar of the cult of personality that they are fermenting is that the glorious leader and his boyars don't make mistakes.
Anything good is his doing, anything bad is someone else's fault. It's very easy for them to act this way, and the base loves it, because the only requirement for behaving in this way is a complete lack of character.
Since it's difficult to project this one on someone else, they do the next best thing - dial up the spite and cruelty against their victim.
Yup.
mitchbob•2h ago