Van Hollen’s Office Mum on Cost to Taxpayers for El Salvador Visit

Sen. Chris Van Hollen’s office is mum about how much the taxpayers had to shell out for his trip to El Salvador — or whether he or someone else paid — in a failed effort to win the release from prison of a former illegal immigrant who resided in his state. 

Spokespersons for the Maryland Democrat’s office did not respond to several phone and email inquiries from The Daily Signal on Wednesday and Thursday asking about the cost of the trip and about how many staffers accompanied the senator when he met with El Salvadoran officials to attempt to get Kilmer Abrego Garcia out of prison.

The Trump administration deported Garcia in March to an El Salvadoran prison as part of its effort to round up and deport known illegal alien gang members. The Justice Department had determined Garcia was a member of the MS-13 gang, but there’s a debate over whether the administration made an error in deporting him because an immigration judge granted him asylum to stay in the United States in 2019.  

A conservative estimate is that the trip could have cost between $1,525 to $2,216 if Van Hollen took only one staffer, stayed only one night, and booked at least a week in advance. That is based on publicly available information for flight ticket costs and the guidelines for government expenses for meals and lodging. 

During her press briefing on Wednesday, White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt said, “It’s appalling that Sen. Chris Van Hollen is incapable of having common sense or empathy for his own citizens.”

At the same briefing, Maryland resident Patty Morin spoke about her daughter Rachel, who was raped and murdered by an illegal immigrant. She also questioned Van Hollen’s travel at taxpayers’ expense for an illegal immigrant.

“To have a senator from Maryland who didn’t even acknowledge, or barely acknowledged, my daughter and the brutal death that she endured, leaving her five children without a mother, and now a grandbaby without a grandmother, so that he can use my taxpayer money to fly to El Salvador to bring back someone who is not even an American citizen,” Morin said. “Why does that person have more rights than I do or my daughter or my grandchildren? I don’t understand this.”

The cost to taxpayers will eventually become public, as such expenses are published quarterly for the Congressional Record, which will likely be available in June. 

Van Hollen appears to have had at least one staffer with him, because he had at least six videos from the trip that were posted on the social media platform X and on YouTube. 

Chris Newman, the attorney for Garcia’s family, also appeared in a video with the senator in El Salvador. 

For senators on official business, domestic travel is restricted to coach class on flights. However, international travel allows for business class, according to Senate staff. Also, committees generally authorize no more than one or two staffers to accompany a senator. 

According to the travel website Travelocity, two nonstop flight tickets in business class booked seven days in advance from Washington Dulles International Airport to the San Salvador International Airport would cost as little as $1,051 to as much as $1,742. The prices would generally be higher if he booked the trip less than seven days in advance.

The Senate follows the guidelines of the General Services Administration and State Department for foreign travel. 

The State Department has country-specific costs for per diem guidelines. The maximum allowable lodging rates in San Salvador are $146 per person per night. The maximum cost for meals and incidental expenses are $91 per person daily. 

Foreign travel for a senator must be authorized by a committee chair, or the majority leader or minority leader, according to the Senate manual. 

The per diem expenses are strictly defined as only lodging and meals.

“A per diem allowance provided a member, officer, or employee in connection with foreign travel shall be used solely for lodging, food, and related expenses, and it is the responsibility of the member, officer, or employee receiving such an allowance to return to the United States government that portion of the allowance received which is not actually used for necessary lodging, food, and related expenses,” the Senate manual says. 

While taxpayers can raise objections or questions about how public money is spent, Van Hollen’s possible use of tax dollars for the El Salvador trip was for official Senate business and does not raise any ethical or legal questions. 

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