García studied law, first at the Pontifical Catholic University of Peru -although the official records of his tenure in this university were never found- and later earning a law degree from the National University of San Marcos in 1971. A year later, he left Peru for Spain, where he studied for a PhD in law. For years García claimed to have earned a PhD; in 2014, however, documents from the university proved he never finished the work for it. In 1974, he travelled to France with other members of the APRA to study at the prestigious University of Paris I. After earning a degree in sociology, he was called by Víctor Raúl Haya de la Torre to come back to Peru in order to run for the Constituent Assembly election in 1978. García was elected a Member of the Assembly, where he impressed his colleagues with his oratory and skillful rhetoric. As APRA's Secretary of Organization, he was assigned to conduct the party's public affairs in the wake of Haya de la Torre's death in 1979.