Kristi Noem Accuses CBS News Of Editing Her Interview To ‘Whitewash The Truth’ About Abrego Garcia

Department of Homeland Security (DHS) Secretary Kristi Noem shared the full portion from her interview on Sunday to show that CBS News cut out her statements about alleged MS-13 member Kilmar Abrego Garcia’s criminal background.

Noem posted the full portion of her remarks about Garcia on X, where she stated on “Face the Nation” that Garcia had ties to MS-13, engaged in human smuggling, solicited nude photographs from minors and allegedly beat his wife. The cable news broadcast version of the interview does not include Noem mentioning Garcia’s criminal past.

“This morning, I joined CBS to report the facts about Kilmar Abrego Garcia. Instead, CBS shamefully edited the interview to whitewash the truth about this MS-13 gang member and the threat he poses to American public safety. Watch for the part of my interview that @CBS tried to cover up,” Noem wrote on X.

CBS News cut out 26 seconds from Noem’s answer to only include her statement about President Donald Trump’s administration fight to ensure that Garcia does not get released back into the U.S.

“This individual was a known human smuggler, a MS-13 gang member, an individual who was a wife-beater, and someone who was so perverted that he solicited nude photos from minors. And even his fellow human traffickers told him to knock it off, he was so sick in what he was doing and how he was treating small children,” Noem said in her full answer.

In the edited version, the segment immediately skipped to CBS News White House correspondent Ed O’Keefe asking whether the administration will continue its effort to deport Garcia to Uganda.

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CBS News settled a $36 million lawsuit with Trump in July relating to the editing of a “60 Minutes” interview with former Vice President Kamala Harris. The president alleged that the network participated in “deliberate deception” by omitting parts of Harris’ answer on former President Joe Biden’s stance on Israel to bolster her chances in the 2024 election.

Garcia has been at the center of a deportation case after the administration mistakenly removed him from the U.S. on March 12. The administration maintained that Garcia, who illegally entered the U.S. in 2011, should remain outside of the U.S. due to his alleged ties to MS-13 and his previous deportation orders in 2019.

Documents provided by Prince George’s County Police Department detailed Garcia’s alleged gang name and rank. In a December 2019 decision, the Board of Immigration Appeals dismissed Abrego Garcia’s challenge to an immigration judge’s factual finding that he is “a verified member of MS-13.”

A judge granted Garcia protected status known as “withholding of removal” in October 2019 after determining that he would likely be persecuted by gangs if deported back to El Salvador, according to the court documents. He settled in Maryland, married American citizen Jennifer Vasquez Sura and has one child.

Garcia was pulled over on a Tennessee highway in 2022 and was suspected of human smuggling after local authorities discovered he was transporting eight passengers with no apparent luggage. The car belonged to an illegal immigrant named Jose Ramon Hernandez-Reyes, who was sent to prison in 2020 for human smuggling.

His wife obtained a restraining order against Garcia in August 2020, alleging that her husband dragged her out of a vehicle by the hair and left her out in the street, broke down doors in their house in January 2020 and pushed her against a wall while breaking TVs and phones in March 2020.

The administration facilitated Garcia’s return in June for him to face human smuggling charges. After being released and then immediately taken back into custody by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), an Obama-appointed federal judge in Maryland blocked the administration from deporting Garcia on Aug. 26.

CBS News did not immediately respond to the Daily Caller News Foundation’s request for comment.