Apr 17, 2025 2 min read

Is our country now doing what England did between 1804 and 1853 when they transported “criminals” to Tasmania? I visited that island in 1998 and learned the conditions in which those prisoners were held. Even small children were transported for the crime of stealing a loaf of bread. When their time of hard labor was up, if they survived, they were released into the wilds with only the rags they were wearing. They were not taken back to their families in England. This is generally considered cruel and unusual punishment.

Well, here we are today sending so-called criminals to El Salvador without due process. Why did we not send the convicted Jan. 6, 2021, insurrection prisoners to El Salvador? No, instead President Trump pardoned these dangerous criminals and released them into our general population. And I don’t buy for one minute that they cannot get Abrego Garcia, the unconvicted father, son and husband from Maryland, back here quickly.

If El Salvador refuses to send Garcia back, our Congress should stop paying El Salvador the millions of dollars of U.S. taxpayers’ money to imprison these people who were sent there illegally without due process when the courts told them not to send them.

The Trump administration should not be allowed to ignore the rule of law.

Mary Lou Burger

Pittsburgh