House Republican committee chairs are denying Democrats’ requests to travel to El Salvador and visit its CECOT prison facility as scrutiny builds on the Trump administration’s handling of Kilmar Abrego Garcia’s mistaken deportation.

House Oversight and Government Reform Committee Chair James Comer (R-Ky.) and House Homeland Security Committee Chair Mark Green (R-Tenn.) this week denied requests from Democrats to use official committee funds for Congressional delegation — otherwise known as CODEL trips — to El Salvador, with Comer calling the request “absurd” and Green saying it would “waste taxpayer dollars.”

The denials come as Sen. Chris Van Hollen (D-Md.) made a trip to the country this week and met with Abrego Garcia, a Salvadoran national who was living in Maryland and whose return the Supreme Court has said the Trump administration should facilitate.

But it also comes as House Republicans are visiting El Salvador and the CECOT prison themselves. Several House GOP lawmakers, led by House Ways and Means Committee Chair Jason Smith (R-Mo.), visited El Salvador and the CECOT prison this week.

Comer

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