Bring. Home. Kilmar. Àbrego. Garcia.
If the Trump Administration can “disappear” a legal resident of this country without due process, it can disappear any of us without consequences.
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Monday, April 21, 2025
Today is the 189th anniversary of the Battle of San Jacinto, which triggered the events that made Texas, first, an independent nation and then, the 28th of these United States.
(Sam Houston at San Jacinto. Painting by Henry Arthur McArdle, now hanging in the Texas Capitol Building.)
Much has been written of the tactical genius of Sam Houston, who retreated across much of the state before choosing history’s Right Time and Right Place to confront Santa Anna’s vastly larger and better-trained army.
(Sam Houston. Unknown artist, 1836.)
Sam Houston went on to become the new Republic’s first President. Twenty-five years later, as the seventh Governor of the State of Texas, he fought against Secession and was forced to resign his office as the Union slid into Civil War. His courage and loyalty to the Union earned him a chapter in John F. Kennedy’s Profiles in Courage.
(The famous Civil War-era photographer Mathew Brady made this portrait of the former Governor in 1861.)
Much has been written about Sam Houston, surely one of the greatest figures in Texas history. Less has been written about the vengeful overreach of some of Houston’s soldiers at San Jacinto, who shot, bayonetted and garroted helpless Mexican soldiers who were surrendering to them. Their cowardice and brutality are a stain on an otherwise great moment in our history as Texans and as Americans.
Which brings us to Kilman Àbrego Garcia, now imprisoned in a Salvadoran hellhole for what the U.S. government admits was an error. But, having made the error, the entire U.S. government doubled down on its cruelty and injustice, taking the ludicrous position that there was nothing the mightiest nation on earth could do to persuade a tinpot Central American dictator to return him.
History will recall the people running our country now as they do those Texians who shot Mexican soldiers in the back as they fled or bayonetted them as they surrendered. And we will view this government’s treatment of Kilmar Abrego Garcia with the same shame we feel when we remember the tawdry denouement of the Battle of San Jacinto.
And, more importantly, the government views the hullabaloo over Abrego Garcia as a test of their plans to kidnap and rendition other American citizens without the benefit of due process. "The homegrowns are next, the homegrowns. You've got to build about five more places," PresidentTrump said to Salvadoran dictator Bukele.
In Memoriam …
The world learned this morning of the death of Pope Francis, whose health problems were serious during the winter. But Francis recovered in the last few weeks, enough that he participated in some of the Vatican’s Holy Week ceremonies.
Francis will be remembered less for his doctrinal innovations than for the example of personal sanctity and pastoral tenderness he set. He managed to please neither the conservatives nor the liberals in his sprawling Church, butt was personally popular with all the faithful. It will be interesting to see whom the Cardinals choose to replace him.
I find it interesting that Nayib Bukele was resolute in his commitment to not return García to the U.S. He smiled and back-slapped with Trump during his Oval Office visit and played the strongman. But when Senator Van Hollen finally gets an opportunity to speak with Garcia, Bukele has him dressed in street clothes and there are a couple of untouched drinks on the table that were put there to make it seem the senator and Garcia were just, you know, hanging out and chatting.
Where’s all the bluster and bravado? Why does Bukele now want to sanewash this event? You don’t suppose he’s nervous, do you? Perhaps he’s nervous about the financial arrangements with the Trump administration being discovered, or he’s worried Trump won’t last, and this whole convoluted rendition scheme will be subject to scrutiny.