Dem Senator Meets Abrego Garcia in El Salvador — Bukele: Inmate Will Remain in Custody

Alleged MS-13 gangbanger Kilmar Abrego Garcia was seen “sipping margaritas” with Sen. Chris Van Hollen Thursday amid his high-profile deportation battle, according to photos shared by El Salvador President Nayib Bukele.

Bukele shared three pics of the Democratic Maryland lawmaker meeting with Abrego Garcia — who was wrongly deported to El Salvador’s notorious megaprison last month — lounging in the country’s “tropical paradise” with what appeared to be salt-rimmed drinking glasses containing an unknown liquid and a cherry.

“Kilmar Abrego Garcia, miraculously risen from the ‘death camps’ & ‘torture’, now sipping margaritas with Sen. Van Hollen in the tropical paradise of El Salvador,” Bukele said in an X post Thursday night.

“Now that he’s been confirmed healthy, he gets the honor of staying in El Salvador’s custody,” Bukele, who said earlier this week that he has no intention of returning Abrego Garcia to the US, wrote in a separate post.

Van Hollen (D-MD) traveled to the Central American nation this week to push for the release of the illegal migrant and purported MS-13 member.

The excursion sparked outrage from the mother of murdered Maryland woman Rachel Morin, 37, who was ruthlessly killed by Victor Martinez-Hernandez, a different Salvadoran illegal immigrant who was convicted Monday of the 2023 murder.

“I just don’t understand this,” Patty Morin told the White House press corps Wednesday, while slamming the senator who she says “didn’t even acknowledge” her daughter’s brutal slaying.

She said Van Hollen instead chose to “use my tax money to fly to El Salvador to bring back a person … who isn’t even an American citizen.”

The White House also took aim at the Democrat for prioritizing “the welfare” of a “terrorist” after the photos of him and Abrego Garcia were shared online Thursday night.

“Chris Van Hollen has firmly established Democrats as the party whose top priority is the welfare of an illegal alien MS-13 terrorist,” the White House said in a statement to The Post.“

It is truly disgusting. President Trump will continue to stand on the side of law-abiding Americans.”

Van Hollen also took to social media to share a photo of him meeting with Abrego Garcia, who was wearing a colorful checkered collard shirt, jeans, sneakers and a Kansas City Super Bowl hat .

“I said my main goal of this trip was to meet with Kilmar,” Van Hollen posted to X, with a picture of the pair sitting outside at a table with what appears to be glasses of water and coffee.

“Tonight I had that chance. I have called his wife, Jennifer, to pass along his message of love. I look forward to providing a full update upon my return.”

The Salvadoran migrant was living in Maryland with his wife and children when he was shipped off with 260 other reputed gang members to El Salvador’s hellhole lockup CECOT last month under the 18th-century Alien Enemies Act — despite never being charged with a crime and repeatedly denying gang allegations.

The Trump administration claimed that Abrego Garcia is part of the vicious MS-13 gang and was living in the country illegally when he was deported.

The administration has since repeatedly defied several court orders, including one from the US Supreme Court, to return him back to the land of the free, and disavowed Abrego Garcia as being “wrongly deported” despite admitting he was booted from the country as a result of a “clerical error.”

His deportation also went against a 2019 order blocking the feds’ ability to remove him to El Salvador on the grounds that he was at risk of retaliation from gangs.

Bukele said Monday at the White House that he has no intention of returning Abrego Garcia — calling the idea “preposterous.”

Amid the public battle over his case, US Attorney General Pam Bondi released documents Wednesday showing Abrego Garcia was an active MS-13 member in 2019 and held the rank of “Chequeo” and the street name “Chele” within the violent international gang.

The Department of Homeland Security also revealed that he was accused of physically abusing his wife, who applied for a protective order, in 2021.

His wife, Jennifer Vasquez Sura, who has fought for her husband’s release, told The Post she asked for protection from Abrego Garcia “out of caution” after she survived domestic abuse in a “previous relationship.”

The alleged gang member’s wife argued that her husband’s alleged abuse “is not justification for ICE’s actions of abducting him and deporting him to a country where he was supposed to be protected from deportation.”