Gangster, wife-beater’: How Trump is trying to cast man wrongly deported to El Salvador as dangerous

The Donald Trump administration, which has admitted in court to wrongly deporting a Maryland man to El Salvador, is trying hard to justify sending him to a notorious prison in the Central American country. Last week, the United States president shared what appears to be a digitally altered image of Kilmar Armando Abrego Garcia to prove he is a gang member.

The Trump administration has also been releasing documents to claim he is a violent man who they say is “never coming back” to the US. It has also been resisting the Supreme Court’s ruling to “facilitate” Abrego Garcia’s return.

Let’s take a closer look.

The ‘altered’ photo

US President Donald Trump shared a photograph of what he said was the hand of Kilmar Abrego Garcia with the word “MS-13” tattooed above four symbols on his knuckles.

“This is the hand of the man that the Democrats feel should be brought back to the United States, because he is such ‘a fine and innocent person.’ They said he is not a member of MS-13, even though he’s got MS-13 tattooed onto his knuckles and two Highly Respected Courts found that he was a member of MS-13, beat up his wife, etc.,” the president posted on X on Friday (April 19) evening.

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This is the hand of the man that the Democrats feel should be brought back to the United States, because he is such “a fine and innocent person.” They said he is not a member of MS-13, even though he’s got MS-13 tattooed onto his knuckles, and two Highly Respected Courts found… pic.twitter.com/31sNr2k1SK

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) April 18, 2025

The Trump administration has repeatedly claimed Abrego Garcia is a member of the infamous Salvadoran gang Mara Salvatrucha, commonly called MS-13. However, US courts have not found that he was a gang member.

Many internet users pointed out that the image shared by Trump seems to be digitally altered.

Linda Higgins, a former Minnesota state senator, wrote on X: “Hey Old Man, @realDonaldTrump, have someone teach you about Photoshop. This is an excellent example of altering a photo, in this case to make your illegal actions look good. But instead you look foolish.”

“‘MS-13’ looks like it was typed on the photo,” wrote another user.

ALSO READ: Trump officials defied court order on deportations: Could this lead to criminal contempt charges?

Kilmar Abrego Garcia’s 2019 arrest

The US government has released unshared documents relating to Abrego Garcia’s previous run-ins with the law.

In March 2019, he was arrested by the Hyattsville City Police Department in Maryland after being found at a Home Depot store with an active MS-13 gang member and two others suspected to be connected to the gang.

CNN reported citing a “gang field interview sheet” from the Prince George’s County Police Department published by US Attorney General Pam Bondi that two of the men “reached into their waistbands and discarded several unknown items under a parked vehicle as the detective approached them. Two “small plastic bottles containing marijuana” were discovered by the police nearby.

The gang member was known as “Bimbo” with previous arrest records for assault, burglary and concealing a dangerous weapon, according to The Telegraph.

The document noted that Abrego Garcia was donning a Chicago Bulls hat and a hoodie “with rolls of money covering the eyes, ears and mouth of the presidents on the separate denominations,” both of which it said was “indicative of Hispanic gang culture” and showed he was a member in “good standing” with MS-13.

An unnamed source told police that Abrego Garcia “is an active member of MS-13 with the Westerns clique.” The documents claim he had the rank of “Chequeo” and the moniker “Chele”.

It also said that Abrego Garcia had previously been “detained in connection with a murder investigation”, without any more details. The Maryland resident and father of three was never charged with murder, as per CNN.

The report also mentions, contradictorily, that Abrego Garcia simultaneously claimed and did not claim that he was afraid of returning to his country. He told the police he was a citizen of El Salvador who entered the US illegally in 2012. Abrego Garcia was detained by immigration authorities following the arrest.

The immigration hearings went on for months in 2019. In October of that year, a judge ruled that Abrego Garcia cannot be sent back to El Salvador over fear of persecution.

‘Domestic violence’ case

Abrego Garcia’s wife filed a temporary protective order against her husband in 2021, according to separate documents made public by the US Department of Homeland Security (DHS).

He allegedly beat his wife, Jennifer Vasquez Sura, whom he married in 2019, after which she sought a restraining order against him.

Describing him as “violent” in a handwritten statement, Vasquez Sura detailed arguments between the couple. As per Fox News, she wrote, “At this point, I am afraid to be close to him. I have multiple photos/videos of how violent he can be and all the bruises he (has) left me.”

The protective order alleged Abrego Garcia slapped her, hit her with an object and detained her against her will. It also alleged that he “punched and scratched her eye,” causing her to bleed.

“According to court filings, Garcia’s wife sought a domestic violence restraining order against him, claiming he punched, scratched, and ripped off her shirt, among other harm,” DHS wrote in a post on X Wednesday (April 16).

The 29-year-old was reportedly asked to leave his family’s home in Maryland and not to contact his wife under the temporary protective order.

After the allegations came to light last week, Vasquez Sura said she sought the protective order “out of caution” and “in case things escalated” due to her previous experience with domestic violence.

“Things did not escalate, and I decided not to follow through with the civil court process. We were able to work through this situation privately as a family, including by going to counselling. Our marriage only grew stronger in the years that followed,” she was quoted as saying by The Telegraph.

Vasquez Sura did not pursue the matter further.

Traffic violation

Abrego Garcia was stopped in 2022 in Tennessee for speeding while he had several other people in the car. Tricia McLaughlin, a spokesperson for DHS, alleged Abrego Garcia’s traffic stop “reek of human trafficking” – referring to multiple people and a lack of luggage in the vehicle.

Vasquez Sura said in a statement that her husband “worked in construction and sometimes transported groups of workers between job sites, so it’s entirely plausible he would have been pulled over while driving with others in the vehicle.”

Speaking to CNN, a spokesperson for the Tennessee Highway Patrol said that Abrego Garcia was brought to the attention of federal law enforcement, “who made the decision not to detain him.”

What does it mean for his case?

The Trump administration is refusing to heed the Supreme Court’s order to “facilitate” the release of Abrego Garcia. This comes even as an appeals court in Washington, DC, rejected the government’s request to block a court order to enforce the apex court’s ruling.

“The government is asserting a right to stash away residents of this country in foreign prisons without the semblance of due process that is the foundation of our constitutional order,” one of the appellate judges wrote.

By making Abrego Garcia’s past encounters with law enforcement public, the US government is attempting to solidify its claims that Abrego Garcia is a violent man.

In a post on X, Homeland Security said: “Kilmar Abrego Garcia had a history of violence and was not the upstanding “Maryland Man” the media has portrayed him as.”

Addressing a press conference last week, Bondi said: “Every American should be thanking president Trump tonight, and every liberal journalist who has called him a ‘Maryland man’ and is saying he was rightfully in this country should be apologising to president Trump.”

With inputs from agencies