Imagine a country where the government can just snatch people off the street and
lock them away for no good reason, never to be seen again.

That country is not a democracy, it is a dictatorship. And Donald Trump is hell
bent on making it reality right here in America.

* The Trump regime has been rounding up immigrants — even people with prior
court orders granting them certain legal protections to remain in the U.S. —
and rendering them to a notoriously brutal prison in El Salvador.

* These flagrantly illegal actions violate one of our nation’s founding ideals,
the core commitment to due process.

* “Due process” means the government cannot deprive you of life, liberty, or
property without giving you a chance to defend yourself. It means you are
innocent until proven guilty. It means you get your day in court.

* The administration has admitted that it mistakenly sent a Maryland resident
named Kilmar Abrego Garcia to the Salvadoran torture prison — an egregious
injustice that has gotten widespread coverage here at home and around the
world.

* Yet neither Trump himself nor anyone in the regime is lifting a finger to
bring this innocent man back home. Worse, they are openly defying court
orders — including from the United States Supreme Court itself — to fix their
mistake.

* On Monday, Trump held an Oval Office meeting with the president of El
Salvador, Nayib Bukele, who has called himself the “world’s coolest dictator”
(we are not making that up).

* During the meeting, Trump came right out and said that he is open to sending
American citizens to Salvadoran detention facilities, saying “homegrowns are
next.” Trump was even caught on camera telling Bukele to build “about five
more” prisons.

* Throughout the meeting between the two authoritarian wannabes, assorted Trump
sycophants could be heard laughing, as if their unabashed fascism is just for
funsies.

We must be crystal clear about what is going on here. Trump is openly telling us
that if he gets away with these vicious and unconstitutional deportations of
immigrants like Kilmar Abrego Garcia, he will keep going.

Who will Trump target next? Unhoused people? Starving senior citizens (once he
and Elon Musk’s DOGE goons are done stripping Social Security and Medicare down
for parts)? Muslims? Native Americans who don’t agree to give up whatever land
they have left? People who attend peaceful rallies outside Tesla dealerships?
People who work at nonprofit organizations that are standing up to the regime?
People who didn’t vote for him?

Some folks may be thinking something like, “Well, if you break the law, you
deserve whatever happens to you.” A few things to say about that:

1. Kilmar Abrego Garcia has not been accused of any crime and no evidence has
been presented that he committed any crime. The same can be said of at least
some of the other people rendered to El Salvador.

2. Any particular person’s guilt or innocence is kind of beside the point. Due
process doesn’t mean nobody can be found guilty. It means there has to be a fair
and consistent process to find out who is and isn’t guilty. If it only applied
to people who weren’t accused (whether rightly or wrongly), it wouldn’t mean
anything.

3. Donald Trump himself may have benefited more from due process than any person
in the history of the world. He has been found guilty of numerous crimes. Many
of us believe he has committed a variety of other crimes. But he didn’t get
summarily dumped in a foreign gulag for the rest of his life. Trump was presumed
innocent. He got his day (many, many, many days) in court.

4. It’s almost as if Trump and his MAGAlytes believe that due process is only
for people who look like him. (That was sarcasm — they definitely believe that.)

This is history happening right before our eyes. We must all join together to
stop the regime’s lawless and authoritarian actions before Donald Trump brings
our country to irreversible shame and ruin.

Here’s one thing you can do right now.

Public Citizen is calling on every member of Congress to speak out against this
profound injustice and for Congress as a whole to do everything in its power —
including holding emergency hearings, conducting investigations, issuing
subpoenas, and withholding funding to the administration — at this defining
moment for our nation.

To Congress: [[link removed]]

The Trump administration’s extrajudicial deportations are a threat to our
nation’s founding ideal of due process and to our very existence as a democracy
rather than a dictatorship. Every member of Congress with a conscience and a
commitment to the rule of law must speak out now. And Congress as a whole must
do everything in its power — including holding emergency hearings, conducting
investigations, issuing subpoenas, and withholding funding to the administration
— at this defining moment for our nation.
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Thanks for taking action.

For justice and democracy,

- Robert Weissman & Lisa Gilbert, Co-Presidents of Public Citizen


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