The Trump administration’s refusal to follow a court order and make any efforts to return the Maryland man mistakenly deported to El Salvador sent CNN legal analyst Elie Honig into a fiery rebuke of the MAGAfied government.
Honig, a former federal prosecutor, built the case Tuesday against the administration’s inaction in returning Kilmar Abrego Garcia back to the United States during an appearance on CNN’s “NewsNight.”
“Either they can’t, or they don't want to, and I think it's pretty clearly they don't want to facilitate,” Honig said.
He added that the word “facilitate” muddied the waters enough so that nobody is really quite sure if the Trump administration is complying with the Supreme Court’s order or not before jabbing the government.
“Now what on earth does that mean? Has the Trump administration overtly defied that? Maybe not quite to the letter, but boy, they are foot dragging – this is the weakest facilitation in the history of facilitating,” Honig said. “They have no interest in playing by good faith, they have no interest in getting – they could get this guy back if they wanted. You don't think one call they could get this guy back? They don't want to do it, and they're playing political games.”
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The CNN analyst blamed the Supreme Court’s language for the ambiguity surrounding the ruling.
“That's what's landed us in this mess,” Honig said Tuesday. “The reason that word has become so important is because that's what the Supreme Court said they did not want to cross this line explicitly. They said, ‘we do not believe it is the role of the courts to order the executive branch what to do when it comes to foreign policy, foreign affairs, immigration.’”
Watch the clip below or at this link.