Taking reporters' questions in the Oval Office, El Salvador President Nayib Bukele and top Trump Administration officials responded to questions of whether Kilmar Abrego Garcia would be returned to the U.S.
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00:00You are doing a great job. Thank you.
00:02Mr. Miller, can you just also respond to that question?
00:06Because, you know, it's asked by CNN, and they always ask it with a slant,
00:10because they're totally slanting, because they don't know what's happening.
00:13That's why nobody's watching them.
00:15But would you answer that question also, please?
00:17Yes, gladly.
00:18So, as Pam mentioned, there's an illegal alien from El Salvador.
00:23So, with respect to you, he's a citizen of El Salvador.
00:27So, it's very arrogant, even, for American media to suggest that we would even tell El Salvador
00:33how to handle their own citizens as a starting point.
00:36As two immigration courts found that he was a member of MS-13,
00:40when President Trump declared MS-13 to be a foreign terrorist organization,
00:45that meant that he was no longer eligible under federal law, which I'm sure you know,
00:49you're very familiar with the INA,
00:50that he was no longer eligible for any form of immigration relief in the United States.
00:54So, he had a deportation order that was valid, which meant that under our law,
01:00he's not even allowed to be present in the United States,
01:03and had to be returned because of the foreign terrorist designation.
01:07This issue was then, by a district court judge, completely inverted,
01:12and a district court judge tried to tell the administration
01:14that they had to kidnap a citizen of El Salvador and fly him back here.
01:18That issue was raised with the Supreme Court,
01:21and the Supreme Court said the district court order was unlawful,
01:25and its main components were reversed 9-0 unanimously,
01:29stating clearly that neither Secretary of State nor the President could be compelled by anybody
01:35to forcibly retrieve a citizen of El Salvador from El Salvador,
01:39who, again, is a member of MS-13,
01:42which, as I'm sure you understand,
01:44rapes little girls, murders women, murders children,
01:47is engaged in the most barbaric activities in the world,
01:49and I can promise you, if he was your neighbor, you would move right away.
01:52So, you don't plan to ask for any help to get him back?
01:55Is that what you did?
01:56The ruling in the Supreme Court, Steve, was it 9-0?
01:59Yes, it was a 9-0.
02:01In our favor.
02:02In our favor, against the district court ruling,
02:04saying that no district court has the power
02:06to compel the foreign policy function of the United States.
02:09As Pam said, the ruling solely stated that if this individual at El Salvador's sole discretion
02:15was sent back to our country, that we could deport him a second time.
02:19No version of this legally ends up with him ever living here,
02:22because he is a citizen of El Salvador.
02:25That is the President of El Salvador.
02:27Your questions about it, per the court, can only be directed to him.
02:30I asked President Bukele,
02:31Can President Bukele weigh in on this?
02:35Do you plan to return him?
02:36Well, I guess most of them suggested that I smuggle a terrorist into the United States, right?
02:41How can I smuggle him into the United States?
02:45If I smuggle him into the United States, or what do I do?
02:48Of course, I'm not going to do it.
02:50It's like, I mean, the question is preposterous.
02:53How can I smuggle a terrorist into the United States?
02:56I don't have the power to return him to the United States.
02:59But you can release him inside of the novel.
03:01Yeah, but I'm not releasing, I mean, we're not very fond of releasing terrorists into our country.
03:05I mean, we just turned the murder capital of the world to the safest country in the Western Hemisphere,
03:09and you want us to go back into the releasing criminals,
03:12so we can go back to being the murder capital of the world.
03:14No, that's not going to happen.
03:16Well, they'd love to have a criminal, you know, released into our country.
03:19I mean, there's a fascination.
03:21They would love it.
03:22Yeah.
03:23These are sick people.
03:25Mark, did you have something to say about that?
03:27Yeah, I mean, Stephen Eitland, I don't understand what the confusion is.
03:30This individual is a citizen of El Salvador.
03:33He was illegally in the United States and was returned to his country.
03:36That's where you deport people, back to their country of origin.
03:39Except for Venezuela, that wasn't refusing to take people back or places like that.
03:43I can tell you this, Mr. President.
03:44No, the foreign policy of the United States is conducted by the President of the United States,
03:48not by a court.
03:49And no court in the United States has a right to conduct the foreign policy of the United States.
03:54It's that simple.
03:55End of story.
03:57And that's what the Supreme Court held, by the way, to Marco's point.
03:59The Supreme Court said exactly what Marco said,
04:02that no court has the authority to compel the foreign policy function of the United States.
04:06We want a case 9-0, and people like CNN are portraying it as a loss, as usual,
04:10because they want foreign terrorists in the country who kidnap women and children.
04:14But President Trump, his policy is foreign terrorists that are here illegally get expelled from the country,
04:19which, by the way, is a 9-10 issue.
04:22Well, Mr. President, you said that if the Supreme Court said someone needed to be returned,
04:25that you would abide by that.
04:26You said that on Air Force One just a few days ago.
04:28And they said that it must be facilitated.
04:31Why don't you just say, isn't it wonderful that we're keeping criminals out of our country?
04:36Why can't you just say that?
04:38Why do you go over and over?
04:40And that's why nobody watches you anymore.
04:42You have no credibility.
04:43Please go.