President Donald Trump met with El Salvador’s President Nayib Bukele at the White House on Monday.
Things heated up when Trump, Buckele, Secretary of State Marco Rubio, and adviser Stephen Miller all took turns tearing into CNN reporter Kaitlan Collins. Bukele said his country will not return Maryland resident Kilmar Abrego Garcia to the United States after Attorney General Pam Bondi said it was up to his country, not the U.S.
The Supreme Court ruled that the Trump administration must “facilitate” his return, but the administration and El Salvador said he will not be returning to the White House.
“How can I return a criminal to the US? Smuggle a terrorist in?” Bukele asked before calling the questions from Collins “absurd.” Buckele said he won’t release Ábrego García because he isn’t fond of releasing people from his prisons.
“The question is preposterous,” Bukele says. “I don’t have the power to return him to the United States.”
Rubio jumped in and also tore into Collins for the question.
“I don’t understand what the confusion is. Abrego Garcia, a citizen of El Salvador, was illegally in the United States and was returned to his country. The foreign policy of the United States is conducted by the president of the United States, not by a court,” Rubio said.
Collins then asked: “You said if SCOTUS said return someone, you’d abide by that?”
Trump hit back: “How long do we have to answer this question from you? Why don’t you just say, ‘Isn’t it wonderful we’re keeping criminals out of our country?’ Why can’t you just say that! Why do you go over and over – that’s why nobody watches you. You have NO credibility.”
WATCH:
Below is a transcript of Trump’s remarks:
Trump: “Well, we had a terrible thing happen. We had a — an administration that allowed people to come in freely into our country from not only South America, but from all over the world, many from the Congo and Africa, Asia, all over the world, Europe — rough parts of Europe. And they came from prisons, and they came from mental institutions, and they came from gangs, and the gangs of Venezuela and other places. And hundreds of thousands and even millions of them came, 21 million people all together, but many of the people that came, just a tremendous percentage of them, were criminals, in some cases violent criminals. We had 11,088 known murderers, half of them murdered more than one person. This was allowed by a man who — what he did to our country is just unbelievable. So we’re straightening it out, we’re getting them out. But what they did and what that party did to our country — open borders, anybody could come in. As soon as I heard that, I said, every prison is going to be emptied out into our country. That’s what happened. And we’re straightening it out. And we just had numbers. We had the highest recruiting numbers in the history of our country going into police departments. And a year ago, we had the lowest numbers. You couldn’t hire a policeman.”
BUKELE: “The biggest change.”
Trump: “Nobody’s ever seen it.”
BUKELE: “From the lowest to the highest.”
Trump: “And the military now, Marines, the Army, Air Force, Coast Guard, every slot is — I mean, we have the best numbers we’ve ever had. We call it recruit — recruitment numbers. And we’ve never had anything like it. We had records on every single — at every single level. But very important, the policemen, the policemen are joining forces now that — we really were having a hard time with policemen because we weren’t protecting our police.”
BUKELE: “Yeah.”
Trump: “And we — we cherish our police. Police are great, and the firemen, and everybody else. But we have the highest numbers that we’ve ever had. The most enthusiasm — great enthusiasm. And on trade and other things we’re doing great. We’re taking in billions and billions of dollars. We made — two weeks ago, I — I gave them a little bit of a pause because, you know, you have to show a little flexibility, but we go back to what we have to do. The markets have been very strong once they got used to it. But we were losing $2 billion a day. There’s no company big like this. This is the biggest deal ever made. Now we’re making $3 billion a day. We’re a great country, but we had stupid people running this country. And I can say it, what they’ve done to us at the border should never and can never be forgotten. It’s a sin, what they did. And you are helping us out. And we appreciate it.”
BUKELE: “Thanks.”
WATCH:
