An American who had been a hostage of Iran called out the hypocrisy of Democrat Sen. Cory Booker of New Jersey for hopping into action for a migrant from El Salvador after previously ignoring the man’s captivity.
Booker excoriated the Trump administration over the case of Kilmar Abrego Garcia, an accused MS-13 gang member who was deported to an infamous terrorist prison in El Salvador. Xiyue Wang claims that Booker did nothing for him while he was held hostage in Iran.
‘Booker never advocated for my release & refused to speak to my wife.’
“The Supreme Court ruled 9-0 that the Trump administration must facilitate the return of Kilmar Abrego Garcia,” wrote Booker on social media. “The story of his detainment is horrifying, all of us must share his story and demand his quick and safe return. An assault on the due process rights of anyone is a threat to the due process rights of everyone.”
The unanimous ruling from the court said that Garcia must be brought back to the U.S., but the Trump administration has claimed that his return is out of its power, while the El Salvadoran president also rejected the idea when questioned by reporters.
Politico reported Tuesday that Booker was organizing a delegation of Democrats to go to El Salvador to try to help Garcia.
Wang responded to the report in a post on social media Tuesday.
“I was an NJ resident, Sen. @CoryBooker’s constituent, when I was jailed in Iran as an American hostage,” he wrote. “Sen. Booker never advocated for my release & refused to speak to my wife. Sen. Booker is a hypocrite.”
When he was confronted with some of the efforts Booker did undertake on his behalf, Wang admitted his error but persisted in his opinion that Booker did not do enough to free him.
“As Sen. Booker’s constituent, I expected him to do more,” he responded. “There are other members in Congress across the aisle, who weren’t my reps and did more, like [Rep.] Chris Smith (D-N.J.) & [Rep. Pramila] Jayapal (D-Wash.).”
“Sen. Booker does not appear to be consistent in advocating for unjustly detained Americans abroad, he seems to take a special interest in this specific case because President Trump deported the person in question,” Wang added.
Critics of the Trump administration argue that the evidence of Garcia’s gang membership was dubious because the man had never been criminally charged after entering the U.S. The claim that he was a gang member was made by a confidential informant and also on the basis that Garcia was wearing a Chicago Bulls hoodie and hat.
Attorneys for the Trump administration also admitted in court that he was deported based on a “clerical error.”
Wang, a Chinese-American graduate student at Princeton University, had been convicted of spying by the Iranian government without evidence and sentenced to 10 years in prison in 2017. The Trump administration was able to secure his release in 2019 as part of a prisoner swap.
Princeton had defended Wang’s actions and said he was innocent of the charges issued by the hostile Iranian government.
“He was not involved in any political activities or social activism,” the university said in a statement, “he was simply a scholar trying to gain access to materials he needed for his dissertation.”
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