Mayor Adams on Tuesday echoed Trump administration talking points on Kilmar Abrego Garcia, a Maryland resident whose accidental deportation to El Salvador has become a major flashpoint in the ongoing fight over the president’s hardline immigration agenda.
Adams’ comments, made alongside Trump border Czar Tom Homan, came as the NYPD and the FBI announced the arrests of more than two dozen Venezuelan immigrants linked to the Tren de Aragua street gang. The mayor spoke about Abrego Garcia’s case without actually naming him, accusing him of being a gang member.
“I won’t have a tequila drink with a gang member,” Adams said. “I won’t be hanging out with them and hugging them, acting like they are victims. They are not victims. They create victims by their actions.”
The Trump administration’s characterization of Abrego Garcia is a contentious issue. The White House previously admitted in court papers that he had been deported as an “administrative error” but has, more recently shifted the narrative, pressing the contention he was a dangerous member of MS-13, a gang that was recently designated a terrorist organization by Trump.
A federal judge has ordered the Trump administration to “facilitate” Abrego Garcia’s return and to provide evidence of the actions it has taken to get him back. The Supreme Court has largely upheld that ruling.
In his Tuesday comments about drinking tequila, the mayor appeared to be referring to an incident last week that Maryland Rep. Chris Van Hollen has said was a phony setup manufactured by El Salvador President Nayib Bukele.
Van Hollen met with Abrego Garcia in El Salvador, where he’s been detained, and they were photographed with drinks that appeared to be margaritas. Van Hollen said those drinks were placed on the table by a Bukele aide, and that neither man drank them.
“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 wrote on social media after the meeting.
Garcia has not been convicted of any criminal offenses and denies any gang ties.
Kayla Mamelak, a spokesperson for the mayor, said Adams believes in due process and that the case will play out in the courts outside of New York. She noted the mayor never specifically named Abrego Garcia.
Earlier in the day Tuesday, at his weekly press conference, the mayor addressed the same issue.
“We have dangerous gangs in our city, and I would not be sipping drinks with them,” Adams said. “I would not turn them into heroes. I would not be sharing a Tito’s and seltzer with them.”
Adams’ comments come amid growing scrutiny of his ties with the Trump White House. He’s been accused of entering into a corrupt deal with the Trump administration, helping the president’s immigration agenda in exchange for his federal corruption case getting dropped. Adams denies any quid pro quo.
“Once again, Mayor Adams made clear that he believes in due process only when it benefits himself,” Murad Awawdeh, President and CEO of the New York Immigration Coalition said in a statement. “By co-signing the disappearance of Kilmar Armando Abrego Garcia — a father and husband — to Bukele’s notorious CECOT torture camp, Adams has aligned himself with the same authoritarian tactics Trump used to vanish New Yorkers to El Salvador. Instead of standing up for the rights of all New Yorkers, the Mayor repeats fiction and nonsense.”
The mayor’s Tuesday comments mark a shift from last week, when he sidestepped questions by CNN’s Dana Bash on whether he was comfortable how the Trump administration deporting people, especially Abrego Garcia.
“Well, you know, one thing I’m clear on is that I’m not a hypocrite,” Adams replied. “I’ve been very clear on my policies. And if we look at the wording in communications, I stated pre-Trump, the President Trump being elected, it’s the same, there’s consistency… I don’t control immigration. It’s a federal issue.”
