BREAKING NEWS: Human trafficking convict confesses Kilmar Abrego García was involved in multiple smuggling operations in 2022.
A new revelation shakes the case of Kilmar Abrego García—known as the “Maryland man” and defended by Democrats as a victim of unjust deportation: the vehicle he was driving in 2022 belonged to José Ramón Hernández Reyes, a convicted human trafficker who confessed to having hired García for multiple illegal immigrant smuggling runs.
According to a report by The Tennessee Star, Hernández Reyes—who was convicted of human trafficking in 2020 and deported after serving 18 months in prison—told the Department of Justice (DOJ) that he paid García to transport migrants from Texas to various destinations across the U.S.
The DOJ granted Hernández Reyes limited immunity in exchange for details about a November 2022 trip in which García was stopped by the Tennessee Highway Patrol.
García, identified as a member of the Mara Salvatrucha gang (MS-13) by the Department of Homeland Security (DHS), was arrested in December 2022 for speeding while transporting nine people without a valid driver’s license. The DHS confirmed that agents suspected he was involved in human trafficking.
The Department of Homeland Security revealed that during his December 2022 arrest, Kilmar Abrego García told the Tennessee Highway Patrol (THP) that he was traveling from Houston, Texas, to Temple Hills, Maryland, with a stop in St. Louis, Missouri.
According to the DHS, García claimed he was transporting eight passengers for construction jobs and that the vehicle was registered under his boss’s name. However, his Maryland driver’s license had expired—a document issued exclusively to illegal immigrants—making him legally unfit to drive in Tennessee.
García’s route raised red flags from the start. The DHS noted that the trip from Houston to St. Louis, which should have taken around 12 hours, took three extra days before reaching Putnam County, Tennessee, where he was stopped.
Moreover, the route through Missouri added over 300 miles and seven unnecessary hours to the trip, passing through cities known for human trafficking activity and MS-13 gang presence, such as Houston and Little Rock, Arkansas—where 79 trafficking victims were rescued in 2023.
Despite the THP’s suspicions of human trafficking, the Biden administration’s FBI ordered the release of García and his passengers.
While Democrats like Senator Chris Van Hollen—who traveled to El Salvador to meet and have breakfast with García—try to portray him as a victim of “unjust deportation,” the evidence points to a dangerous criminal tied to MS-13 and human trafficking. It’s a reality progressives seem determined to conceal in order to advance their open borders agenda.
In contrast, the Trump administration took decisive action by deporting him in March 2025, sending a clear message: criminals have no place in the United States.
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