President Donald Trump posted an image of himself holding a photograph of what he said was the tattooed hand of Kilmar Armando Abrego Garcia, whom the government deported to El Salvador in March despite an order not to deport him there. 

To Trump and the White House X account, the tattoos are proof that Abrego Garcia belongs to the MS-13 gang, which his family and lawyers have consistently denied. But the photograph appears to have been altered to include the lettering "MS-13" above other symbols, which the White House has not explained. Experts in criminal gangs said nothing in the photograph is a known signifier of MS-13. 

The photograph shows a left hand with four tattoos, one on each finger — a marijuana leaf, a smiley face with the letter X for eyes, a cross and a skull.

The hand also displays, in a printed font, M, S, 1 and 3 above these tattoos. The words for the symbols also appear below each one in a small typeface. 

"This is the hand of the man that the Democrats feel should be brought back to the United States, because he is such ‘a fine and innocent person,’" Trump’s post says. "They said he is not a member of MS-13, even though he’s got MS-13 tattooed onto his knuckles."

The figures M, S, 1 and 3 and the words below the symbols don’t appear in other photographs of Abrego Garcia’s hand, including the one taken by Salvadoran government officials (and shared on X by El Salvador’s president, Nayib Bukele) when Abrego Garcia met with Sen. Chris Van Hollen, D-Md., on April 17.

We asked the White House whether "MS-13" is tattooed on Abrego Garcia’s hand or whether the photo had been altered, perhaps to show that each of the pictorial tattoos represented one of those letters or numbers. The White House did not respond to our inquiry.

We also asked Abrego Garcia’s attorneys about the photograph and their client’s tattoos. They did not respond. 

Several gang crime experts urged caution about assuming that any of the tattoos provide proof of MS-13 ties. MS-13 experts said the tattoos’ iconography was unfamiliar, and that those symbols have common meanings in mainstream tattooing.

"Very common and real gang signifiers will be things like crowns and pitchforks and teardrops, all of which have different meanings," said David M. Kennedy, a John Jay College of Criminal Justice professor. "Without more information and context, one can’t usually look at tattoos and say with confidence that this is what that means."

The Abrego Garcia case and gang allegations

The Trump administration deported Abrego Garcia on March 15 to CECOT, a Salvadoran mega-prison where Trump has sent hundreds of Salvadoran and Venezuelan men who were previously in the U.S. But Abrego Garcia had a protection order that was supposed to prevent him from being deported to El Salvador. U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement lawyers acknowledged that they were aware of the restriction and in court filings called his removal an "oversight" and "an administrative error."

The Trump administration has said that Abrego Garcia and others deported to El Salvador were MS-13 gang members, which Abrego Garcia and attorneys have denied in court filings.

In March 2019, Abrego Garcia was looking for day labor outside a Home Depot in Maryland in 2019 when Prince George’s County police took him and three others into custody. Once at the police station, officers asked Abrego Garcia if he was a gang member, and he told him that he wasn’t, according to a March 2025 court filing by his attorney, Simon Sandoval-Moshenberg.

Immigration and Customs Enforcement booked Abrego Garcia into custody. A police informant told police Abrego Garcia was an MS-13 member, according to a report known as a "gang field interview sheet." 

Abrego Garcia’s attorneys have repeatedly denied the accusation in court, saying it was fabricated. 

Abrego Garcia was taken into Immigration and Customs Enforcement custody, where judges denied bond, both initially and on appeal, citing the police informant’s accusation. He was released from ICE custody, and he eventually worked as a sheet-metal apprentice in Maryland, married a U.S. citizen and had a child. Two judges later said that the government didn’t prove Abrego Garcia is a gang member. 

Abrego Garcia’s attorneys have sought to reverse his deportation, but the government has argued that since he left U.S. jurisdiction, it cannot take action. The Supreme Court ruled, without dissent, that the government needs to "‘facilitate’ Abrego Garcia’s release from custody in El Salvador." (Abrego Garcia has since been moved to a lower-security prison, according to news reports.) 

What do the tattoos in the photograph mean?

Marijuana leaves, crosses and skulls are widely used as tattoos by people who do not belong to gangs. Gang crime experts said they did not stand out to them as MS-13 markers.

"I don’t believe a ‘dangerous individual’ would have such anodyne and farcically generic tattoos on his hand," said Liliana Castañeda Rossmann, a California State University San Marcos emerita professor of communication and author of the book "Transcending Gangs: Latinas Story Their Experience."

Sean Kennedy, a former federal public defender in California and now a Loyola Law School professor, said that in his experience representing and interacting with current and former MS-13 members, "The tattoos in the photo don't look familiar to me."

In fact, Kennedy said, such designs are out of character with typical MS-13 tattoos. 

"Within MS-13 culture, such markings would likely be frowned upon and even viewed as a sign of cowardice, as they could be interpreted as an attempt to hide or downplay gang affiliation," Kennedy said. "That type of concealment goes against the gang's norms, which often demand bold, visible demonstrations of identity and loyalty."

Charles Katz, director of Arizona State University’s Center for Violence Prevention and Community Safety, concurred. 

While Katz said that local law enforcement would be more familiar with specific tattoo designs in a given region, "I have worked on issues related to MS-13 for the past 15 years in El Salvador and the U.S. and I have never seen tattoos or graffiti suggesting that these particular tattoos are associated with MS-13."

Experts said tattoos can be helpful in identifying gang members, as long as they are one of multiple pieces of evidence, rather than used on their own. 

"While police gang experts often use so-called gang tattoos as circumstantial evidence of alleged gang involvement, in my experience, they never use tattoos alone as definitive evidence of gang affiliation," Kennedy said. "This is particularly true where, as here, the tattoos are ambiguous and may reflect things other than gang ties, such as religion, loss, personal transformation or cultural identity."

Other evidence that would bolster a determination of gang affiliation include presence at known gang locations and prior criminal charges and convictions, Kennedy said. 

"In El Salvador, I worked with gang members who had MS-13 tattooed on their face, upper body and lower body," Katz said. "However, tattoos are being used less frequently today due to their use as evidence."

PolitiFact Senior Correspondent Amy Sherman contributed to this article.