Republican Rep. Kevin Hern of Oklahoma’s 1st Congressional District has returned from his trip to a notorious mega-prison in Central America.
Hern told Newsmax on Friday he toured the Terrorism Confinement Center, or CECOT, in El Salvador and he supports President Donald Trump’s push to send people there.
“The reality is President Trump is going to make our nation safer, because without a safe nation, you have no nation,” said Hern.
Hundreds of Venezuelans accused of being gang members were speedily deported in March to CECOT. Trump’s push to expel more detainees without judicial approval was temporarily halted by the U.S. Supreme Court over the weekend.
A Maryland man admittedly sent to CECOT by mistake has also been much in the news lately. Hern said Kilmar Abrego García will never get out of the prison human rights groups call “cruel.”
“And (Abrego García’s) being held by President Bukele and his government officials, and he will not be released. They have prisons, as it was defined to us. They’re not rehabilitation centers or correction facilities. These folks will never see the light of day,” said Hern.
Abrego García, a 29-year-old father who entered the U.S. illegally from El Salvador as a teenager, had protected status, meaning he should not have been deported. The Trump administration said as much but has done “nothing of substance” to get the sheet metal worker back, according to a district judge.
News of Hern’s trip surfaced last week, when the U.S. Embassy in El Salvador posted a picture on X of Hern standing next to Rep. Riley Moore (R-WV). Moore drew attention for sharing photos of himself flashing two thumbs up in front of crowded CECOT cells.
Still, Moore, like Hern, echoes Trump’s boosters, who say the president is decisively dealing with an issue of national security.
Hern’s office didn’t respond to questions from KWGS around reported efforts to expand CECOT.
