On Friday, Kilmar Abrego-Garcia was released from custody in Tennessee. He returned to Maryland where he was allowed to visit with his family.
On Saturday, the illegal immigrant truck driver — who allegedly killed three people by making an illegal u-turn in Florida — was denied bail and charged with three counts of vehicular homicide and immigration violations.
Care to guess which story ABC, CBS and NBC chose to cover and which one was completely censored?
The case of the truck driver, who came to the U.S. illegally in 2018 via the Southern border, obtained a commercial driver’s license (CDL) in California and Washington, failed an English test and whose work authorization was rejected by the first Trump administration, has YET to be covered on any of the broadcast evening or morning shows.
However, an illegal immigrant case ABC, CBS and NBC can’t get enough of, is their favorite cause celebre of the year.
From Friday (August 22) evening through Monday (August 26) morning ABC, CBS, NBC spent 17 minutes and 21 seconds on the alleged wife-beating, human-trafficking, MS-13 gang member.
So why the discrepancy?
If the broadcast networks properly reported on the Florida truck crash story it would force them to admit that perhaps the Trump administration was correct in denying illegal immigrants CDLs.
In fact, NewsBusters’s Clay Waters discovered that the media HATED Trump’s English proficiency order for truckers before the deadly Florida crash.
However, the Abrego-Garcia case allowed ABC, CBS and NBC to portray the Trump administration as cruel for separating Garcia from his loving family.
The following August 25 CBS Mornings report was typical of the overly-sympathetic tone of coverage:
CORRESPONDENT CAMILO MONTOYA-GALVEZ: Good morning. Kilmar Abrego-Garcia just arrived here in Baltimore to report to the ICE Field Office behind me and there is a chance, Nate, that he could be taken into custody once again by Immigration officials. As you can see, people behind me have gathered to express support for a Abrego Garcia in this latest chapter of a flash point in President Trump’s crackdown on illegal immigration.
[Clip of Abrego-Garcia arrival]
This was the moment Friday when Kilmar Abrego-Garcia reunited with his family in Maryland after months in detention. The 30-year-old Salvadoran man who entered the country illegally in 2011 was taken into ICE custody in early March. He was deported to El Salvador and transferred to a notorious mega prison known as CECOT despite a 2019 court order that prohibited officials from sending him to his home country due to persecution concerns.
In late March, the Justice Department admitted Abrego Garcia’s deportation was an administrative mistake. After a month of dispute, Abrego Garcia was brought back to the U.S. in early June, but only to face federal charges of human smuggling, stemming from a 2022 traffic stop in Tennessee. He has pleaded not guilty.
PAM BONDI (U.S. Attorney General): He was a smuggler of humans and children and women.
GALVEZ: On Friday, a federal judge released Abrego-Garcia from criminal custody ahead of a trial next year, but just hours later, the Trump administration told Abrego- Garcia, he could soon be deported to Uganda. In a statement, Friday, Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem said she will not stop fighting until Abrego-Garcia is out of the U.S. but Maryland`s Governor demanded due process.
GOV. WES MOORE (D-MD): I just simply want a court and a judge to decide, and not simply the President of the United States or the Secretary of Homeland Security, who is who’s trying to be judge, juror, prosecutor and executioner.
GALVEZ: Attorneys for Abrego Garcia say the Trump administration offered their client a plea deal that would see him being sent to Costa Rica after he completes his criminal sentence here in the U.S., and the lawyers say that their client is being forced, quote “to choose between a guilty plea and then relatively being safe or being renditioned to Uganda where his safety and liberty could be at risk.” Gayle.
CO-HOST GAYLE KING: Neither one seem like great choices.
For this study MRC analysts looked at the broadcast evening (ABC World News Tonight, CBS Evening News, NBC Nightly News) and morning news shows (ABC’s Good Morning America, CBS Mornings, CBS Saturday Morning, CBS Sunday Morning, NBC Today, NBC Sunday Today) from August 17 through the morning of August 26.