Kilmar Abrego Garcia was paid $100K a year smuggling guns, minors

Allegations against the left’s favorite “Maryland man” included how much he was believed to be raking in each year for smuggling adults and minors — and worse.

(Video Credit: Fox 17 Nashville)

After accusing President Donald Trump’s administration of wrongly deporting illegal alien Kilmar Abrego Garcia and demanding the Salvadoran be brought back to the United States, Democrats were seeing the “due process” they begged for play out in spectacular fashion in a Nashville, Tennessee courtroom. Friday, a hearing had included two cooperating witnesses alleging Sen. Chris Van Hollen’s (D-Md.) “constituent” was making $100,000 per year as part of a smuggling operation that included people, firearms and potentially rape.

On X Friday, NewsNation senior national correspondent Brian Entin posted, “I’m at the Kilmar Abrego Garcia hearing now in Nashville. Prosecution has a cooperator who says Garcia was making $100,000 a year smuggling guns and people including minors across the border for years.”

I’m at the Kilmar Abrego Garcia hearing now in Nashville. Prosecution has a cooperator who says Garcia was making $100,000 a year smuggling guns and people including minors across the border for years.

— Brian Entin (@BrianEntin) June 13, 2025

During the hearing before Magistrate Judge Barbara Holmes, the first witness for the U.S. Attorney’s Office was Homeland Security Investigations Special Agent Peter T. Joseph with a focus on the bodycam footage from Abrego Garcia’s 2022 traffic stop in Tennessee.

At the time, the Salvadoran had claimed he was driving his employer’s Chevy Suburban from St. Louis, Missouri, to Maryland for a construction job with an expired driver’s license, a point that officers noted appeared inconsistent with reality as they made note of the lack of construction tools or luggage in the vehicle.

Instead, the Chevy had reportedly been modified to fit a fourth row of seating and contained 10 people, six of whom were identified as illegal aliens — including one who was only 15 years old at the time.

Authorities investigating the claim that Abrego Garcia had been driving between Missouri and Maryland indicated that the vehicle could not be confirmed to have traveled through St. Louis, but license plate readers had picked it up in Houston, Texas, and crossing from the Lone Star State into Louisiana. Additionally, Joseph said the vehicle’s owner was Jose Hernandez-Reyes, himself a convicted smuggler.

The first cooperating witness alleged Abrego Garcia made between $1,000 and $1,500 for each person being smuggled, which included transporting children who were forced to sit on the floorboards.

At one point, the prosecution also sought to raise allegations of the defendant’s treatment of women and girls being smuggled, which included accusations of raping minors. However, the judge had limited the testimony after an objection had been made by the defense.

On top of claims the Salvadoran man was pulling in six figures from smuggling people, a second witness agreed with the sum Abrego Garcia was making while adding the operation included drug smuggling and the purchase and transport of firearms that were then hidden beneath the children during the cross-country drive. It was also alleged that nearly a third of those smuggled were gang members.

Further testimony remained forthcoming after Friday’s hearing, and the judge had yet to determine whether or not Abrego Garcia would be released on bail once a trial date was set.

Staff Writer

Native of Brooklyn, NY, Kevin Haggerty is a graduate of Hunter College where he studied Cultural Anthropology and Geography. An avid reader and truth seeker, he currently resides in Texas with his wife and their dog and, when he isn’t researching current events and their impacts, you’ll find him spending time with friends and family or working on his next novel.

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