EAGLE, Colorado — U.S. Sen. John Hickenlooper on Tuesday urged the U.S. Supreme Court to start holding Trump administration officials in contempt of court and “lock them up” if they refuse to comply with the court’s unanimous order to “facilitate” the return of a Maryland man wrongly deported to a notorious mega-prison in El Salvador.
“The Supreme Court’s got to step up and say, ‘All right, we’re going to start holding people in contempt of court.’ They have the ability to sanction,” Hickenlooper said in an interview with Colorado Newsline. “They can take the people, the officials who deny any culpability or any responsibility, they can bring them in and force them to testify, to come to the court. And if they don’t come, they’re in contempt, and then you lock them up.”
Following a roundtable press event with local officials worried about what massive cuts to the federal workforce will mean for mountain towns surrounded by federally owned forests, Hickenlooper took questions from local and state media.
Hickenlooper was asked about President Donald Trump’s statements on Monday in a joint White House press conference with El Salvadoran President Nayib Bukele at which Trump urged Bukele to build more prisons and told him “homegrowns are next” — an apparent reference to U.S. citizens. Bukele reportedly replied, “all right.”
“I did not think he meant citizens. I disagree with you,” Hickenlooper said in Eagle on Tuesday, but he was told by a reporter that Trump repeated the remarks on Fox News, emphasizing he means “homegrown criminals.”
“No, he wants to send U.S. citizens down to …?” Hickenlooper said. “Well, again, if this doesn’t get the Supreme Court in action, I don’t know what will. But obviously at a certain point, and we’re close to that point, the country’s going to rise up because there are certain things …” He didn’t complete the thought.
A federal judge in Maryland on Tuesday ordered the Trump administration to show evidence it has attempted to secure the release of Kilmar Abrego Garcia, who was mistakenly deported to a brutal mega-prison in El Salvador. District Judge Paula Xinis said the current record shows “nothing has been done.”
A federal judge in Washington, D.C., on Wednesday launched proceedings to determine if Trump administration officials should face criminal contempt charges over the deportations case in his court, and in Colorado on Monday, a federal judge in Denver ordered the Trump administration not to deport any detainees held in Colorado under the 1798 Alien Enemies Act.
Abrego Garcia, a Salvadoran citizen living in Maryland who is married to a U.S. citizen, has a valid U.S. work permit, and has children who are U.S. citizens, was deported last month with hundreds of others under the legally questionable Alien Enemies Act. Federal authorities have admitted in court that his deportation was a mistake.
“I agree that that’s the most hideous, heinous act I’ve seen, where you can take an innocent person, pick them up for the wrong reason … and they put him in one of the most dangerous, insect- and vermin-infested prisons in the Western Hemisphere,” Hickenlooper, a former Democratic Denver mayor and Colorado governor, said. “That prison in El Salvador is notorious for how dangerous it is. And now they’re saying that they can’t get him out of there. I’m fully aware, and that will not stand. I cannot believe the Supreme Court’s going to allow that to stand.”
A reporter asked Hickenlooper what the U.S. Senate can do about the case.
“You want me to get my pitch fork?” Hickenlooper said. “The Senate, we don’t have a police force. Do you think we have a police force? We already have hearings planned and laid out on this stuff. We’ll shine a bright light on it.”
Hickenlooper said he understands the growing anger in the country directed at both the Republican Party in power for its increasingly unpopular agenda and Democrats, whom some blame for not putting up enough of a fight against administration policies. He said he felt that anger personally at a town hall in Grand Junction Monday, where people were “pretty frustrated and pissed off.”
“It’s going to be a battle. It’s going to be a war,” Hickenlooper said. “And the only real leverage that we have as a Congress in a constitutional democracy is to have people rise up. What I said to the group last night is, ‘You’ve got to organize.’ I said to the group here (in Eagle), ‘You’ve got to organize. You’ve got to demonstrate, you’ve got to march, you have to rise up.’ No senator shows up and says, ‘Hey, come watch me.’ That’s not going to change anything.”
Independent Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders has been drawing massive crowds around the country for his “Fighting Oligarchy” tour with Democratic U.S. Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez of New York, both last month in Denver and more recently in deep-red Idaho.
Hickenlooper is running for reelection in 2026.
To read more stories from Colorado Newsline, visit www.coloradonewsline.com.
