The family of Kilmar Abrego Garcia, who is currently imprisoned in El Salvador after being errantly deported by the Trump administration, has gone into hiding after the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) posted their home address online.
Jennifer Vasquez Sura, Abrego Garcia’s wife, expressed grave fears over her family’s safety in an interview with The Washington Post this week. The attention her family has received due to her husband’s case is worrying, she said — especially after DHS shared details about the family’s whereabouts to millions of social media users.
Earlier this month, the department published a copy of a temporary civil protective order that Vasquez Sura had filed against Abrego Garcia in 2021. That order expired after one month, when Vasquez Sura declined to renew it.
In a statement regarding that action, Vasquez Sura said that she had requested the order out of “caution after a disagreement” the two had at the time. She had filed the request for the order due to her experience with domestic violence in past relationships, she said — and DHS using that record to attack Abrego Garcia’s character was out of line.
“No one is perfect, and no marriage is perfect,” Vasquez Sura said earlier this month. “That is not a justification for ICE’s action of abducting him and deporting him to a country where he was supposed to be protected from deportation. Kilmar has always been a loving partner and father, and I will continue to stand by him and demand justice for him.”
DHS shared the record on its X account in an attempt to justify Abrego Garcia’s deportation. The department failed to block out personal details about Vasquez Sura, including her home address — forcing her and her family to move to a safe house, Vasquez Sura told The Post.
“I don’t feel safe when the government posts my address, the house where my family lives, for everyone to see, especially when this case has gone viral and people have all sorts of opinions,” Vasquez Sura said.
DHS has defended its decision to publicize her personal info, telling The Independent that “these are public documents that anyone could get access to” — despite the fact that members of the Trump administration have previously denounced the doxxing of right-wing figures.
The administration, which admitted earlier this year that Abrego Garcia was wrongfully deported, has sought to justify continuing his incarceration in El Salvador by baselessly claiming that he is a member of a violent gang, a characterization his family has vehemently denied. The White House has failed to put forward evidence to back their claims, instead sharing photos of Abrego Garcia’s hand tattoos and citing the types of hats he wears in an attempt to somehow bolster their case.
Meanwhile, legal experts have sounded the alarm on Abrego Garcia’s deportation, noting that the administration violated his due process rights by denying him the ability to defend himself against the White House’s allegations.
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