CNN —
Sen. Chris Van Hollen said Thursday he was denied entry to a maximum-security prison in El Salvador when he tried to check on the “health and wellbeing” of Kilmar Armando Abrego Garcia.
The Maryland Democrat told reporters in San Salvador that he he had been “stopped by soldiers at a checkpoint about three kilometers” from the notorious CECOT prison, where he had driven with Chris Newman, a lawyer for Abrego Garcia’s wife and mother.
“There’s been no ability to learn about [Abrego Garcia’s] health and wellbeing,” Van Hollen said.
The US lawmaker traveled to the Central American nation on Wednesday in a push for the man’s release. Abrego Garcia, a Salvadoran national and Maryland resident, was mistakenly deported to El Salvador in March, and in the weeks since, his case has become a flashpoint in the fight over the Trump administration’s hardline deportation push.
Van Hollen said that denying Abrego Garcia access to his lawyers “is a violation of international law.”
“El Salvador is a party to the international covenant on civil and political rights. El Salvador has signed and ratified that covenant. And that covenant says, and I quote, ‘A detained or imprisoned person shall be entitled to communicate and consult with his legal counsel,’” he said.
Van Hollen’s attempt to enter CECOT came a day after El Salvador’s vice president denied him access following an in-person meeting.
The Salvadoran government was “unfazed” by the Maryland senator’s attempt to visit Abrego Garcia, according to a high-level source close to the country’s president.
“Salvadoran officials are focused on formal diplomatic channels with US counterparts and not on public-facing pressure or unscheduled visits,” the source told CNN.
Salvadoran President Nayib Bukele – who is out of the country – has no intention to return early or to meet with Van Hollen, the source said.
Nevertheless, the Salvadoran government is fully aware of the senator’s movements within the country, particularly when attempting to access highly sensitive or secure sites “as they would be with anyone approaching those locations,” the source said.
Salvadoran authorities have not formally charged Abrego Garcia, and are not bound by a strict timeline to do so, according to the source, under the country’s ongoing state of exception, which suspends certain constitutional rights.
While Abrego Garcia had not been legally in the US prior to his deportation, a 2019 court order said he could not be returned to El Salvador and the Trump administration admitted in court documents he was deported there due to a clerical error.
In recent days, however, Trump administration officials have denied that he was mistakenly deported. US officials have alleged he is a member of the MS-13 gang, which the administration has designated as a foreign terrorist organization – a claim his attorneys dispute and at least one federal judge has voiced skepticism toward.
Van Hollen on Thursday again accused the US government of violating Abrego Garcia’s right to due process and emphasized that was his reason for traveling to El Salvador.
“I am not here to vouch for any particular set of facts or claims, but I am here to vouch for the judicial system in the United States, which guarantees individuals the right to due process,” he said.
Other Democratic delegations, he said, are “in the works now,” and while a Republican congressional delegation had recently been allowed to visit CECOT, Van Hollen said: “They did not ask to meet with Kilmar. That was not part of their mission.”
Van Hollen said he also met with the US Embassy team during his visit, as well as representatives from DHS, FBI, and DEA to discuss joint efforts between the United States and El Salvador to “crack down on transnational gangs like MS-13.”
CNN’s Maija Ehlinger contributed to this report.
