The U.S. Government's Extraordinary Pursuit of Kilmar Ábrego García | Hacker News Reader

The U.S. Government's Extraordinary Pursuit of Kilmar Ábrego García

newyorker.com

106 pointsmitchbob35 comments

In addition to everything that is terrifying about Kilmar Ábrego García's case, we have the VP and President of this country making clearly biased remarks on an active criminal case against a resident of the United States who is married to a US citizen. Is there a more clear case of violation of due process and civil rights?

>" the VP and President of this country making clearly biased remarks on an active criminal case against a resident of the United States"

I am sorry to break it to you, but this happens all the time, and is not a violation of due process. You can find examples of many Presidents declaring opinions on the guilt or innocence of a variety of people before their trials. [1] It makes sense that this is allowed, as the Justice Department is a part of the Executive Branch, so all prosecutions are done with the tacit or explicit approval of the President. It would be more problematic if the judges in the case expressed views on guilt or innocence before hearing the case.

[1] https://www.commondreams.org/newswire/2011/04/25/obama-decla...

Just because something is common, we shouldn't accept it if we believe it to be wrong. Slavery was once widely tolerated, as was marital rape. But people in those days decided that these things were wrong and should not be tolerated. Had they listened to arguments like yours we would still be living in those conditions.

There's also an argument to be made for holding our political officers to a much higher standard than the general populace.

That sounds nice, but US is mostly a democracy, and to the extent it is a constitutional republic those principles only hold to the extent people are willing to acknowledge them and assent to be ruled under them.

So you're saying we shouldn't ask people to acknowledge them and to be ruled under them? If you keep arguing on those grounds then we're going to be saying "that's nice but we live in the real world" all the way to a failed state.

People are not acknowledging and ruled under the constitution as written and intended and the amendments thereafter, for a very long time.

For one very obvious example, observe that it is illegal to notice an opium poppy is growing in a forest, then take and smoke it, and somehow that magically being interstate commerce.

At this point the government as we know it would totally collapse were it not the people willfully and deliberately violate the tenants of the constitutional republic we live under. And most of them, seem to agree with that.

Do you think the Justice Department should prosecute people they believe to be innocent? If not, it seems that every prosecution is an expression of the view that the accused is guilty, and by allowing the JD to proceed, the President is expressing approval of the view. Can you please point out the error in this logic?

The potential source of error is the assumption that the president has the authority to stop a prosecution (short of the pardon power). I say "potential" because a "unitary executive" advocate would claim this is true, and it is becoming more true during the second Trump administration, although it was notably false during the first one. [In prior administrations, including Trump I and Obama, the DOJ appointed independent counsel precisely to prosecute cases the president would have disagreed with prosecuting.]

Belief is not binary and can change with new evidence. You may believe it is likely someone is innocent, but should still witness all the evidence to update your beliefs. In the rare case that there is concrete and infallible evidence that the accused IS innocent, they are typically not prosecuted, or it wraps up very quickly.

This is the entire purpose of a jury trial. The intent is that the jury bears witness to all of the facts of the situation and listens to the prosecution's and defense's interpretation of those facts, and then decides whether the defendant committed any or all of the crimes they are accused of.

The error is this logic is that it precludes the possibility that the Justice Department thinks (know for a fact even) that he is innocent but is pursuing the case anyway because political pressure from the President preferring him to be punished rather than admit a mistake.

I don't see the comment's argument as being that this is okay because it's common. It's just pointing out that this is nothing completely new and that it's a shame that it gets pointed out in a selective way when it could have been called out even earlier under other administrations. That's completely fair if one genuinely cares about due process instead of just dogmatic sniping..

Well aren't military judges part of the executive branch and members of the armed forces? So the president is in their chain of command which makes those remarks by Obama especially egregious.

I think you're right, but the military has different rules about due process, which you may not find convincing. A good example of the difference is the Captain's Mast.

Read up on the concept of unlawful command influence https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Unlawful_command_influence

It was a throwaway line at the end of a fundraiser. Obama misspoke and was widely criticized widely, even internationally. It does not happen all the time. Obama's gaffe does not make it common.

Aren’t they lying when they know the truth? Calling them biased statements waters down the issue

You have a good point, they're lying. The sane-washing works even when we know it's happening.

US govt's ego is hurt! They are aggressively trying to prove - one way or another - they were right.

To be fair, whenever a DA/the DOJ/an agency has its sights on someone and is trying to pursue a civil suit/conviction/agency action, there is a presumption that it will continue until it's settled or goes to trial or what have you. When they give up, it's an exception to the general rule.

https://archive.ph/2025.09.15-111938/https://www.newyorker.c...

Because this bullshittery is worth pointing out every fucking time: Here's another perfectly valid post on this site, related to previous unflagged posts on the same subject, easily no less relevant than many other non-tech posts that garner no shortage of comments and don't get flagged, getting flagged by some childish ass. Assholes will asshole, and bots may bot but you'd think the site's admin could start pulling its head out of its ass just enough to brake some of the permissive flagging habits on HN a tad.

The abusive behaviour of the US government towards Kilmar Abrego Garcia is just petty and meaningless. He hurt Trump's ego, and now Trump's lackeys are trying to make an example of him.

A justifiable pursuit.

“Gobierno corrupto.”

Yup.

Just as a reminder, deportees to CECOT were subjected to beatings, torture, and rape. Both Bukele and the Trump administration know this, know innocent people were dumped there for an intended life sentence, blatantly lied about it, and seem to find the whole thing *funny*.

It’s self-evident what supporters of these individuals will look like in the history books.

The vindictive attack on an ordinary citizen is pretty horrible. It looks personal. It may leave Kilmar a civil court path to sue Trump personally for damages.

They're idiots who are throwing good money after bad in order to keep from admitting that they made a mistake.

MAGA voted for revolution, and they got Hillary Clinton (Trump's political idol since the 90s.) No matter who you vote for, you somehow get Hillary Clinton.

Everything that he is doing is what he said that he'd stop, except deportations of illegal aliens, attacks on public sector workers, and closing slush funds disguised as foreign aid, which his base (and others) very much support. The cutting of the public sector turned out to be a scam (barely anyone was cut, they were cut stupidly) and the slush funds were just shifted directly to the Pentagon; and although he closed the border, he was barely deporting. The Epstein failure, the Ukraine failure, and the Israel failure are also painfully obvious, and obviously things he could end at will (except he's obviously implicated by Epstein.)

So what he chose to do was to escalate the public show, the extravaganza of deportations. He tried to do it in the noisiest, most publicity aware way by picking fights with the most dingbat Democrats, creating alligator swamp prisons, and unleashing military in the streets of Democratic cities.

Since his backers (and every politician's backers) in the arms and oil industries want him to overthrow Venezuela, he's tried to somehow link what is overwhelmingly popular (the deportation of illegal aliens) with something stupid and unpopular (regime change in Venezuela) by talking about "illegal alien gang drug terrorists."

Ábrego García was a mistake that he got caught on, that he stupidly made a poster child for this PR strategy, and he's too dumb to let it go.

And to be fair, he sort of can't because it makes you wonder how many other mistakes there are, and then you can't give him the benefit of the doubt to push through the fast deportations he's trying to do to get around deliberately obstructionist judges.

Even worse, García is an illegal alien, and most people who voted for Trump want him deported anyway, no matter how nice he is. But Trump committed to painting immigrants as dangerous when statistically they're less dangerous than American natives. It's the second generation that become criminals, because they catch up to the US rate for people in their economic strata.

He could go back on that dumb claim, but it's not only been his brand since the first election, it's now tied to his excuse for continuing the siege of Venezuela, and escalating it to an outright attack. Also, the conquest of Venezuela would be a real legacy, because the US has become a country of thieves, and Venezuela has a lot to steal.

This is the real consideration. He doesn't care about immigration at all, which is why he isn't deporting, and isn't going after employers (who aren't Korean) but making exceptions and extolling H1Bs to MAGA rage. Attacking Venezuela is just going to lead to more Venezuelans coming in (and is why they're here now), and they'll just get a "legal" process that lets in just as many as the illegal process, in order to kill wages. Whoever you vote for, you get Hillary Clinton.

Actually, Obama and Biden deported more people than trump. trump's just doing it in a more random, arbitrary, sensational, and enthusiastically cruel way.

Or he's deporting less people but the right ones.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com