Littwin: It’s not just Kilmar Abrego Garcia. Now it’s all of us.

The federal district court judge who ruled that the Trump administration must “effectuate” the release of Kilmar Abrego Garcia — who was mistakenly sent to a notorious El Salvador mega-prison even though he was court-protected from deportation there — is back on the case.

And — as Donald Trump could attest — with a vengeance.

In a hearing Tuesday, Judge Paula Xinis ruled that Trump must obey the Supreme Court’s order, which is very much like her order except they changed her “effectuate” to “facilitate.” And that Xinis will begin a process within days to learn what, if anything, the Trump administration has done to facilitate, effectuate or take any action at all toward Abrego Garcia’s release. So far, she says, it seems that Trump has done nothing.

Of course, Trump, because he’s Trump, claimed he won the Supreme Court decision that he actually lost, meaning he couldn’t possibly be defying the court’s orders. This is what they call circular logic, if logic, even the circular kind, could be applied here. 

It’s ludicrous on its face. But that doesn’t mean it won’t be heard with due seriousness, even the part where Trump officials claim this is all a matter of foreign policy and national security.

What we might be facing is the beginning of that showdown many of us have been waiting for between Trump and the basic rule of law, with Supreme Court Chief Justice John Roberts eventually having to make the call. You think he’d have the nerve to rule directly against Trump in a matter this critical? I wish I could say with confidence that he would.

But you can feel a shift — I know I can — which isn’t to say we know which side will win. But outrage has bubbled up near the surface, and not just in Judge Xinis’ courtroom. The shift began in earnest when Trump went tariff crazy, unaccountably starting a needless global trade war in the process, and when in the same period hundreds of thousands, maybe millions worldwide, hit the streets in protest.

Want early access to
Mike’s columns?

Subscribe to get an
exclusive first look at
his columns twice a week.

SUBSCRIBE

Since then, matters have only grown worse. And it’s time every sentient being — including many semi-sentient Democratic politicians and, even more critically, a majority of the hopefully still breathing Supreme Court — understands how the stakes have changed and how they, themselves, must change, too.

It accelerated rapidly in Monday’s shameful Oval Office moment — one in a series — between wannabe dictator Donald Trump and the El Salvador president who calls himself the “coolest dictator” in the world. Was it me or did the Orange One look green with envy?

In any case, the two authoritarians congratulated each other for saying it was impossible to send Abrego Garcia home to the United States because … well, who knows? 

Actually we do know. Trump doesn’t want him home to testify about the conditions of the El Salvador prison. And El Salvador President Nayiv Bukele said it was “preposterous” that Abrego Garcia would be released because the Cool Guy knew that’s exactly what Trump wanted him to say. And let’s not forget that Trump, beyond taking the role of Bukele’s mentor, is also paying him $6 million to keep the 258 people he sent to prison there. 

If Trump wanted Abrego Garcia to return, he’d be back in Maryland, where he lived with his U.S. citizen wife and their children, in a Mar-a-Lago minute. Which is why Bukele came up with the odd notion, as Trump nodded in approval, that to release Abrego Garcia in compliance with the Supreme Court would mean he’d have to  “smuggle a terrorist” into the United States. 

Of course, despite what Trump and his sycophants say, Abrego Garcia has never faced charges of terrorism or of gang activity. He came to the U.S. from El Salvador when he was 16, without papers, to escape gang violence. Now Trump, without benefit of trial, insists he is a terrorist, even though he has been in the U.S. for 13 years without any criminal record. But he does have tattoos, I believe.

And now he, along with the 257 others who were sent to the El Salvador gulag in the dead of night without so much as a trial, are basically stuck there.

The turmoil began when the Trump administration briefly admitted it had screwed up — I think that’s the technical term — when it sent Abrego Garcia back to El Salvador. Now it says — of course — it did nothing wrong. Stephen Miller, Trump’s deputy chief of staff, went on Fox to say, “This was the right person sent to the right place,” while claiming that the person who said there had been a mistake was a “saboteur.”

And he told these lies with a straight face. Trump’s press secretary repeated Trump’s claim that Abrego Garcia is a member of MS-13, a notorious gang that Trump has proclaimed a terrorist group. But there is scant — if any  — evidence that Abrego Garcia was ever in any gang. And yet he’s in a gulag with little hope of ever being released.

What the two dictators said as the cameras rolled was all bad enough, all tragi-farcical enough, all in defiance of the courts and of what’s left of Americans’ trust in the rule of law.

What came off camera — which was picked up off a hot mic, although some are saying that’s what Trump wanted to happen — was far, far worse.

And it means, if you listen carefully, that we are all Abrego Garcia.

Here’s what Trump said as they entered the Oval Office before the press was allowed in, according to a livestream posted on Bukele’s X account. They were talking of how U.S. citizens accused of violent crimes could be sent to El Salvador’s gulag without benefit of due process.

“Homegrown criminals next,” Trump said.

“I said homegrowns are next, the homegrowns. You gotta build about five more places.”

Bukele was heard responding “all right” as others in the room laughed.

“It’s not big enough,” Trump added of the  CECOT (Terrorism Confinement Center) prison.

Homegrowns is apparently the MAGA term for U.S. citizens they don’t like. But Trump may be right that the prison isn’t big enough.

It’s certainly not big enough to hold Trump’s towering ego and malignant narcissism. 

But if you somehow don’t think Abrego Garcia’s case matters — or if you don’t believe the many news reports showing that many of those sent to El Salvador haven’t been found guilty of anything — maybe I can help.

Or maybe Trump can.

Because as it stands now, we have moved well beyond farce, even if we’re holding steady on the tragedy.

In an interview Tuesday, Trump said he would love to send off some homegrowns — “if it’s legal.”

He added to Fox Noticias: I call them homegrown criminals. I mean, the homegrowns that grew up and something went wrong and they hit people over the head with a baseball bat. We have — and push people into subways, just before the train gets there, like you see happening sometimes. We are looking into it, and we want to do it. I would love to do that.” 

That’s when the laughter began in my house. We have prisons for Americans in, you know, America. Lots of them. And we keep building more.

But maybe you think these guys belong in the gulag because Trump says so. Or maybe you think it’s too dangerous to oppose Trump on this matter because you might get snatched and grabbed off the street like that Tufts Ph.D. student.

Or maybe everyone is now beginning to realize that no one is safe when the Constitution is shredded and there is no rule of law left in place to protect us, much less an El Salvador-born migrant trapped in a Kafkaesque world of Trump’s making.

Mike Littwin has been a columnist for too many years to count. He has covered Dr. J, four presidential inaugurations, six national conventions and countless brain-numbing speeches in the New Hampshire and Iowa snow. Sign up for Mike’s newsletter.

The Colorado Sun is a nonpartisan news organization, and the opinions of columnists and editorial writers do not reflect the opinions of the newsroom. Read our ethics policy for more on The Sun’s opinion policy. Learn how to submit a column. Reach the opinion editor at opinion@coloradosun.com.

Follow Colorado Sun Opinion on Facebook.