United States Representative, Jamie Raskin likened President Donald Trump and President Nayib Bukele to dictators in his condemnation of U.S. foreign prison and Kilmar Abrego Garcia's deportation to EL Salvador.
The White House and President Bukele have ruled out flying Garcia back, insisting he is an illegal alien and a member of the MS-13 designated as a terrorist organization in February.
In an interview with Pod Save America, Raskin said the U.S. should be talking about cutting off aid to El Salvador, calling Bukele's claim that he doesn't have any power to return an American prisoner “ridiculous.”
“He's our legal agent in this dubious arrangement they've created,” he fumed. “Of course he's got the power to return him. He and Trump are just acting like a couple of dictators having fun at the expense of a man's life and his family.”
Raskin urged the Democrats to agree that when they return to power, “we are not going to look kindly upon people who facilitated authoritarianism in our country. That's an assault on our constitution and our people.”
The lawmaker promised that his party members would do everything within their power to get Garcia released, including sending more members to El Salvador, following Senator Van Hollen's trip last week.
“It's a lawless situation and we have to see to it that the Supreme Court's 9-0 decision is actually enforced. There's no argument for what the administration has done. None whatsoever.
“We are living in an authoritarian police state if anybody can be swept off the street and transported to a tortuous prison in another country,” Raskin warned, fearing the possibility of the authorities detaining and removing even citizens without hearing.
On the president's threat to send Americans to foreign prisons, the Maryland Congressman labeled it “unconstitutional,” pointing out that banishment was a form of punishment that existed during the colonial era.
The Supreme Court, he predicts, would find that Trump's proposed action violates the ban on cruel and unusual punishments under the 8th Amendment, and due process which protects citizens from “arbitrary dictatorial power.”
Raskin said the creation of any foreign prison must be endorsed by the U.S. Congress, adding: “We are the lawmaking power, it's not up to the president to just make some idea of a foreign prison and start it”
The top Democrat on the House Judiciary Committee cited the Steel Seizure Case in 1952 when the Supreme Court ruled that the president derives his power from two places: the constitution and an act of Congress.
On the pitch by Defense contractors encouraging the White House to build more prisons in El Salvador and declaring some parts as U.S. soil, Raskin replied: “We're living in something like a gangster state now.”
The law professor emphasized that no one has the right to use taxpayer resources to set up offshore prisons and a justice system that has nothing to do with America's rule of law and due process.
“They look at Guantanamo Bay as some kind of towering example of what they like to reproduce all over the world. We have to stop that to prevent a slide into complete dictatorship. Donald Trump is a convicted felon, could he be sent off to a foreign prison?”, he asked.
Raskin further accused the Trump administration of separating people from their families, lawyers, denying the right to counsel, and engaging in “banishment which hasn't been seen for centuries.”
