The Department of Homeland Security’s complaint about being under a gag order on Saturday in its case against Kilmar Abrego Garcia, a Maryland man who the Trump administration illegally deported to a notorious prison in El Salvador earlier this year, likely violated the court order.
Tricia McLaughlin, the Assistant Secretary for Public Affairs at the DHS, said that Abrego Garcia being able to make viral TikTok posts was unfair in a rant on X: “American justice ceases to function when its arbiters silence law enforcement and give megaphones to those who oppose our legal system.”
But this “gag order” isn’t specific to Abrego Garcia’s case. As a Saturday court filing states, local criminal rule in the Middle District of Tennessee already blocks DOJ and DHS employees from making extrajudicial remarks that will ‘have a substantial likelihood of materially prejudicing” a defendant’s right to a fair trial. In other words, it is not politically motivated.
McLaughlin’s post boosted another post calling Abrego Garcia an “MS-13 terrorist.” The Trump administration has accused Abrego Garcia of being a member of MS-13, which a federal judge has ruled as unfounded.
This is something they’ve weaponized for years: when one of theirs is accused of a crime, they blow up Faux “News” and social media complaining that there’s nothing there, the charges are bogus, etc. In their minds it’s a win-win: if the government pushes back, they get challenged in court (more fodder for the mill about how unfair things are); if they lose the case due to the responses, they can claim it was all fake and politically motivated; and if the government stays silent, they’re able to embed in their followers’ minds that the accused was innocent and it was all political anyway.
Now that they’ve put Faux “News” hosts in charge of everything, they’re pissed they actually have to color within the lines instead of just sneaking smearing shit everywhere.