WASHINGTON - El Salvador President Nayib Bukele told reporters during a meeting with President Donald Trump on Monday that he would not return a man the Justice Department said it had mistakenly deported to his country.

"How can I return him to the United States? Like if I smuggle him into the United States?" Bukele said, sitting beside Trump in the Oval Office, when asked if he’d return Kilmar Abrego Garcia. "Of course I'm not going to do it. The question is preposterous."

Asked if he’d be released in his own country, he said, “We’re not very fond of releasing terrorists.”

Trump then turned to Bukele and said of the assembled reporters: "They'd love to have a criminal released into our country. These are sick people."

Trump also said he wants Bukele to take in as many criminals "as possible."

Garcia has never been charged criminally in the U.S. or El Salvador, according to court filings.

Justice Department officials have acknowledged that Garcia should not have been sent to El Salvador because of an immigration judge's 2019 order barring him from being sent there, and the Supreme Court has called his removal illegal and directed the administration to "facilitate" his return while being respectful of the president's authority.

In the Oval Office meeting, Secretary of State Marco Rubio said he didn’t understand “the confusion” over the order, arguing “the foreign policy of the United States is conducted by the president of the United States, not by a court, and no court in the United States has a right to conduct a foreign policy of the United States.”

Attorney General Pam Bondi added, "If they want to return him, we would facilitate it, meaning provide a plane. That’s up for El Salvador if they want to return him. That’s not up to us.”

The exchanges came shortly after top White House adviser Stephen Miller told Fox News on Monday morning that Garcia was "sent to the right place."

"He was not mistakenly sent to El Salvador," Miller said, pushing back on the Justice Department's repeated assertions in numerous court filings that Garcia was sent to a notorious Salvadoran prison last month because of "an administrative error."

Miller said that if Bukele were to return Garcia, "he would be deported the second time to El Salvador."

The Trump administration struck a $6 million deal with El Salvador to imprison deportees it says are members of the Venezuelan gang Tren de Aragua and members of the street gang MS-13. The administration has labeled both gangs as foreign terrorist organizations.

Lawyers for Garcia have said the U.S. has more control over the prisoners in the jail than it claims, noting the Trump administration is paying $6 million to keep them there. (Source: NBC News)

Story Date: April 15, 2025