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kilmar abrego garcia
Charges Against Kilmar Ábrego García Thrown Out After Judge Finds Vindictive Prosecution
"Our client... is freed of these outrageous, vindictive charges," said an attorney representing Ábrego García. "It’s a good day."
May 22, 2026
A federal judge on Friday dismissed criminal charges against Kilmar Ábrego García, the man whom the Trump administration unlawfully deported to El Salvador last year.
Judge Waverly Crenshaw of the United States District Court for the Middle District of Tennessee ruled that the US Department of Justice's (DOJ) case against Ábrego García should be thrown out on grounds of selective and vindictive prosecution.
In his ruling, Crenshaw likened the President Donald Trump's DOJ to a prosecutor who picked "the person first and the crime second" when it indicted Ábrego García on human smuggling charges last year.
Crenshaw, an appointee of former President Barack Obama, zeroed in on the fact that the DOJ reopened a three-year-old investigation into a Ábrego García mere days after the US Supreme Court unanimously ordered the Trump administration to facilitate his return to the US, arguing that the timing and other evidence established "likeliness of vindictiveness" of the government's case.
While the government provided arguments attempting to rebut claims of vindictive prosecution, Crenshaw ultimately found them unpersuasive and argued that the "new evidence" the government used to justify reopening the case was something that prosecutors should have discovered before with due diligence.
After an examination of the government's claims, Crenshaw found that its case against Ábrego García was reverse engineered to justify his unlawful removal to El Salvador—where he was imprisoned at the notorious Terrorism Confinement Center (CECOT).
"The objective evidence here shows that, absent Ábrego's successful lawsuit challenging his removal to El Salvador, the government would not have brought this prosecution," Crenshaw wrote in his conclusion. "The executive branch closed its investigation on the November 2022 traffic stop. Only after Ábrego succeeded in vindicating his rights did the executive branch reopen that investigation."
Sean Hecker, an attorney representing Ábrego García, celebrated the judge's ruling shortly after it was issued.
"We are going to savor this one," Hecker wrote in a social media post. "Our client, Kilmar Ábrego García, is freed of these outrageous, vindictive charges. It’s a good day."
Aaron Reichlin-Melnick, senior fellow at the American Immigration Council, warned that Ábrego García is not yet out of the woods given that the Trump administration is still trying to deport him to Uganda even though he has said he would accept being deported to Costa Rica.
Reichlin-Melnick nevertheless said that this was a major victory against the Trump administration.
"It is extremely hard to win a vindictive prosecution motion," he wrote, "but here the evidence was so strong that the judge had almost no choice but to grant it."
New York University law professor Ryan Goodman described Crenshaw's ruling as an "extraordinary rebuke" of the Trump DOJ, and noted that it highlighted the role played by acting US Attorney General Todd Blanche in the vindictive prosecution "nearly 30 times."
Journalist Nathan Newman said that Ábrego García deserved praise for standing firm in the face of relentless pressure by the federal government and fighting back.
"When history is written," wrote Newman, "the bravery and tenacity of Kilmar Ábrego García in defiance of the Trump administration will deserve a hefty credit for building the resistance to Trump's evil. A good day."
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Judge Rules Trump Admin Must Give Due Process to Venezuelans Sent to El Salvador Torture Prison
"This ruling makes clear the government can't just send people off to a brutal foreign prison with zero due process and simply walk away," said an ACLU lawyer representing the men.
Dec 23, 2025
A federal judge has ruled that the Trump administration acted illegally when it deported over 200 Venezuelan nationals to a notorious prison in El Salvador without due process earlier this year.
On Monday, Judge James Boasberg of the US District Court for the District of Columbia ordered the Trump administration to submit plans by January 5 for 137 men to contest their designation under the Alien Enemies Act of 1798, which allows foreign nationals from "hostile" nations to be removed without hearings.
In March, Trump invoked the Alien Enemies Act to deport two planeloads of Venezuelan nationals to El Salvador without any explanation or court hearing. They were sent to a mega-prison known as the Terrorism Confinement Center, or CECOT, which is known to subject inmates to torture and severe deprivation, with zero contact with the outside world.
The administration claimed the men were members of the Venezuelan gang Tren de Aragua, which the administration referred to as a "hybrid criminal state" invading the United States. In reality, only a few dozen of the 238 men sent to CECOT had any criminal charges against them. As part of the US Immigration and Customs Enforcement's (ICE) efforts to fast-track their deportations, many were rounded up based solely on the fact that they had tattoos.
“Plaintiffs should not have been removed in the manner that they were, with virtually no notice and no opportunity to contest the bases of their removal, in clear contravention of their due-process rights,” Boasberg wrote.
Boasberg is the same judge who launched criminal contempt proceedings against the Trump administration in April for "willful disregard" of his order to stop the flights to El Salvador. A pair of Trump-appointed judges later halted those proceedings.
In a "60 Minutes" special that was recently spiked by CBS News' Trump-friendly editor-in-chief, Bari Weiss, several inmates testified to the conditions they were subject to inside CECOT.
"The first thing they told us was that we would never see the light of day or night again," said college student Luis Muñoz Pinto, who came to the US from Venezuela in 2024 through the legal asylum process. He said the CECOT director told prisoners, "Welcome to hell. I'll make sure you never leave."
According to a report published by Human Rights Watch in November, inmates were beaten daily, subject to sexual violence by guards, deprived of basic food, medical treatment, and hygiene, and forced to participate in degrading torture rituals.
Pinto, who now lives in Colombia, has no criminal record. "I never even got a traffic ticket," he said.
While the Trump administration claimed it no longer had jurisdiction over the prisoners once they were in El Salvador, and therefore could not follow court orders to bring them back to the US, this was belied by filings from the government of the far-right Salvadoran President Nayib Bukele at the United Nations, which stated that "the jurisdiction and legal responsibility for these persons lie exclusively" with the US.
The men detained at CECOT were then transferred, mainly to Venezuela, in July as part of a prisoner exchange for 10 US nationals.
Boasberg says the US government "maintained constructive custody" of the men while they were interned in CECOT and that it violated their rights to due process by not allowing them to contest the accusations that they were gang members.
He said the Trump administration must give them a "meaningful opportunity to contest their designation," by allowing them to return to the US for a court hearing. He said the government "could also theoretically offer plaintiffs a hearing without returning them to the United States so long as such a hearing satisfied the requirements of due process."
"This ruling makes clear the government can't just send people off to a brutal foreign prison with zero due process and simply walk away," said Lee Gelernt, an attorney for the ACLU, who served as lead counsel for the plaintiffs.
The Trump administration will almost certainly appeal the ruling. And while many of the former CECOT inmates may seek to return for their day in court, some say the experience has left them traumatized and fearful of returning to the United States.
Jerce Reyes Barrios, a professional soccer player and youth coach, returned to Venezuela after being released in July. According to his attorney, he was falsely accused due to a tattoo that the government claimed was a gang symbol, but was actually based on the Real Madrid soccer logo.
"I've focused my time on taking care of my daughters, coaching young kids, all to avoid those thoughts. At night, I sometimes have nightmares, and I feel like I'm still in CECOT," Reyes Barrios told ABC News. "At this moment, I'm not ready to decide if I want to fight this case."
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Federal Judge Issues Restraining Order Forbidding Agents From Re-Detaining Abrego Garcia
Judge Paula Xinis argued that Ábrego García was likely to suffer "irreparable harm" absent a court order barring ICE from imprisoning him.
Dec 12, 2025
A federal judge issued a restraining order on Friday morning barring federal immigration enforcement agents from re-detaining Kilmar Ábrego García, the man whom the Trump administration unlawfully deported to El Salvador earlier this year but who was released from custody on Thursday.
In the ruling, US District Judge Paula Xinis granted an emergency order sought by Ábrego García's attorneys to forbid the government from taking him back into custody when he appeared at the US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) Baltimore Field Office for a scheduled appointment later in the day.
The emergency order was necessary because the ICE Order of Supervision on Thursday night obtained a court order authorizing Ábrego García's removal from the US mere hours after Xinis ordered his immediate release from ICE custody after granting his habeas corpus petition.
In her ruling, Xinis argued that Ábrego García was likely to suffer "irreparable harm" absent a court order barring ICE from imprisoning him.
"If, as Ábrego García suspects, respondents will take him into custody this morning, then his liberty will be restricted once again," Xinis wrote. "It is beyond dispute that unlawful detention visits irreparable harm."
The Trump administration this past June complied with a Supreme Court order to facilitate Ábrego García’s return to United States after it acknowledged months earlier that he had been improperly deported to El Salvador, where a US immigration judge had ruled years earlier he faced direct danger from gang threats against him and his family.
While imprisoned in El Salvador’s infamous Terrorism Confinement Center (CECOT), Ábrego García’s attorneys allege he was subjected to physical and psychological abuse “including but not limited to severe beatings, severe sleep deprivation, inadequate nutrition, and psychological torture.”
Upon his return, the US Department of Justice promptly hit him with human smuggling charges to which he has pleaded not guilty.
President Donald Trump and Attorney General Pam Bondi have also accused Ábrego García of being a member of the gang MS-13, although they have produced no evidence to back up that assertion.
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'A Forceful Stand for Our Constitution': Judge Orders Release of Kilmar Ábrego García
Judge Paula Xinis found that the Trump administration redetained the Salvadoran father of three "without lawful authority."
Dec 11, 2025
A federal judge on Thursday ordered the immediate release of Kilmar Ábrego García—who was wrongfully deported to El Salvador by the Trump administration earlier this year—from US Immigration and Customs Enforcement custody.
"Since Ábrego García's return from wrongful detention in El Salvador, he has been redetained, again without lawful authority,” US District Judge Paula Xinis wrote in her ruling. “For this reason, the court will grant Ábrego García's petition for immediate release from ICE custody.”
In early April, Xinis—an appointee of former President Barack Obama—ordered the Trump administration to facilitate Ábrego García's return to the United States after he was deported in March to the abuse-plagued Terrorism Confinement Center (CECOT) maximum security prison in El Salvador. This, after the US Department of Justice (DOJ) admitted in a court filing that Ábrego García was wrongfully deported due to what it called an "administrative error."
The US Supreme Court also weighed in on the case in favor of Xinis' ruling. However, the Trump administration refused to comply with the judge's order, arguing that it had no legal obligation to return Ábrego García to the US and could not force El Salvador's government to free him.
The DOJ dubiously contended that Ábrego García—a 30-year-old Salvadoran father of three who entered the US without authorization when he was a teenager—was a member of the gang MS-13, an allegation based on a statement from an anonymous police informant. The Trump administration deported him despite a judge's 2019 ruling that he could not be removed to El Salvador because he could be tortured there.
An attorney representing Ábrego García said at the time that his client suffered beatings and "psychological torture" while imprisoned at CECOT.
Ábrego García was transferred to a lower security Salvadoran prison before being sent back to the US on June 6 to face DOJ charges for allegedly transporting undocumented immigrants, to which he pleaded not guilty. He was immediately taken into custody and sent to an immigration detention facility in Tennessee.
On July 23, federal Magistrate Judge Barbara Holmes in Tennessee ruled that Ábrego García must be released from custody pending his trial. That same day, Xinis issued a simultaneous ruling in Ábrego García's wrongful deportation case blocking ICE from immediately seizing him once released in Tennessee and ordering the government to provide at least 72 hours' notice before attempting to deport him to any third country.
As Ábrego García was released on August 22, the US Department of Homeland Security (DHS) informed him that he could be deported to Uganda—one of several nations to which the administration has sought to send him. A bid by Ábrego García to reopen a previous bid for asylum in the US was denied in early October by an immigration judge.
Ábrego García is currently being held in an immigration detention center in Pennsylvania. Responding to Xinis' latest ruling, DHS spokesperson Tricia McLaughlin said Thursday that "this is naked judicial activism by an Obama-appointed judge."
"This order lacks any valid legal basis and we will continue to fight this tooth and nail in the courts," she added.
Advocates for Ábrego García welcomed Thursday's ruling.
"For months, the Trump administration has sought to deny Kilmar Ábrego García his rights to due process and fair treatment by our justice system," US Sen. Chris Van Hollen (D-Md.)—who met with Ábrego García in El Salvador in April—said on social media.
"Today’s ruling by Judge Xinis—requiring the government to immediately release him—is a forceful stand for our Constitution and all of our rights," he added.
Lydia Walther-Rodríguez, chief of organizing and leadership at CASA, hailed what she called "a moment of joy and relief."
“Kilmar finally gets to return home to his family, where he belongs," she said. "No one should be separated from their loved ones while fighting for justice.”
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DOJ Whistleblower Details Being Ordered to Lie in Court About Kilmar Abrego García
"It is the highest, most egregious violation of a lawyer's code of ethics to mislead a court with intent," said Erez Reuveni.
Oct 20, 2025
A former US Department of Justice lawyer on Sunday described how an appointee of President Donald Trump told him to lie about Kilmar Abrego García’s supposed ties to the gang MS-13 after he was wrongfully deported to El Salvador earlier this year.
During an interview with CBS News' "60 Minutes," whistleblower Erez Reuveni said that he was told by a superior at DOJ to argue in court against bringing Abrego García back to the US on the grounds that he was an MS-13 member and a "terrorist."
Reuveni said that he refused to sign onto this strategy because the claims being made about Abrego García were flatly untrue.
"That is not correct," he said of the claims. "That is not factually correct. It is not legally correct. That is, that is a lie. And I cannot sign my name to that brief."
Reuveni went on to say that, even if Abrego García had been a gang member, his right to due process was still being violated by the Trump DOJ.
"What matters here is that they did everything they did to him in violation of his due process rights," he said. "What's to stop them if they decide they don't like you anymore, to say you're a criminal, you're a member of MS-13, you're a terrorist, what's to stop them from sending in some DOJ attorney at the direction of DOJ leadership to delay, to filibuster, and if necessary, to lie?"
Reuveni also discussed how the Trump DOJ had defied court orders by rushing to send a plane full of purportedly undocumented immigrants to be detained in El Salvador’s Terrorism Confinement Center (CECOT), a facility that for years has drawn criticism for alleged systematic human rights abuses.
Specifically, he said that former Trump DOJ official Emil Bove—who was confirmed to a lifetime seat as a federal judge earlier this year, even after Reuveni first spoke out against him—said during a meeting in February that the department was to not let anything interfere with the planes that were transporting the immigrants to El Salvador, even if it meant defying direct court orders.
The very next day, government lawyer Drew Ensign, who had been at that meeting, told Judge James Boasberg in court that he had no idea whether the government was planning imminently to fly the planes out of the country. Reuveni said this shocked him because it was impossible to believe that Ensign sincerely had no idea that the government was planning to fly the planes out that very day.
"It is the highest, most egregious violation of a lawyer's code of ethics to mislead a court with intent," Reuveni emphasized. "We really did tell the court, screw you. We really did just tell the courts, we don't care about your order. You can't tell us what to do. That was just a real gut punch."
"60 Minutes" correspondent Scott Pelley noted during the interview that while Reuveni previously spoke out about Bove's directive to disregard court orders, the interview on Sunday marked the first time since then that the former DOJ lawyer had broadcast his allegations in a TV appearance.
Reuveni acknowledged that the interview brought up safety concerns for him and his family.
"At the same time, I think about what we're losing in this moment, I think about why I went to the Department of Justice—to do justice. I took an oath to uphold and defend the Constitution," he said. "I would not be faithfully abiding by my oath if I stayed silent right now.”
This is the first time former DOJ attorney Erez Reuveni has shown his face in such a public way. He says he felt he needed to speak out despite his safety concerns.
“I took an oath to uphold and defend the Constitution,” Reuveni says. “I would not be faithfully abiding by my… pic.twitter.com/osLCRDIfVm
— 60 Minutes (@60Minutes) October 19, 2025
Abrego Garcia was detained in El Salvador for two months, with the Trump administration repeatedly claiming it had no way to return him to the US, before he was finally transferred to the US, where he is facing human smuggling charges. He was transferred to a detention facility in Pennsylvania last month and the Trump administration is still seeking to deport him.
He pleaded not guilty to the charges in June.
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Judge Rejects Kilmar Abrego Garcia's Bid to Reopen Asylum Claim
The judge ruled Abrego Garcia had presented "insufficient evidence" to show that the Trump administration planned his "imminent removal to Uganda."
Oct 02, 2025
Kilmar Ábrego García, the man whom the Trump administration wrongly deported to El Salvador earlier this year, has been denied a bid to reopen his asylum case.
The Washington Post reported on Wednesday that Immigration Judge Philip P. Taylor rejected Ábrego García's asylum request, as he found "insufficient evidence" to show that the Trump administration planned his "imminent removal to Uganda," even though the US Department of Homeland Security wrote in a social media post in late August that he would be processed for removal to that nation.
In explaining his ruling, Taylor noted that the government had not yet filed any paperwork to send Ábrego García to Uganda, and a government attorney said that deporting him to Uganda was merely a possibility not a foregone conclusion.
Ábrego García now has 30 days to appeal to the Board of Immigration Appeals.
The Trump administration this past June complied with a Supreme Court order to facilitate Ábrego García's return to United States after it acknowledged months earlier that he had been improperly deported to El Salvador, where a US immigration judge had ruled years earlier he faced direct danger from gang threats against him and his family.
While imprisoned in El Salvador’s infamous Terrorism Confinement Center (CECOT), Ábrego García's attorneys allege he was subjected to physical and psychological abuse "including but not limited to severe beatings, severe sleep deprivation, inadequate nutrition, and psychological torture."
Upon his return, the US Department of Justice promptly hit him with human smuggling charges to which he has pleaded not guilty.
President Donald Trump and Attorney General Pam Bondi have also accused Ábrego García of being a member of the gang MS-13, although they have produced no evidence to back up that assertion.
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'Malicious Abuse of Power': Trump Slammed for New Arrest of Ábrego García and Deportation Threat
"This vindictive behavior is not just about Mr. Ábrego García; this is once again the administration showing that it can weaponize the law to punish people standing up for their rights and make our immigrant neighbors afraid," said one advocate.
Aug 25, 2025
A crowd of community members who had gathered outside an immigration office in Baltimore on Monday chanted, "Shame!" as a lawyer for US resident Kilmar Ábrego García announced that he had been detained by Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents once again—days after he was finally released from prison after a monthslong ordeal.
Attorney Simon Sandoval-Moshenberg told the crowd that assembled to show support for Ábrego García that ICE had ordered the Maryand father and sheet metal worker to report to its offices for an interview on "false" pretenses and said his legal team is filing a habeas corpus petition to challenge the administration's plan to deport Ábrego García to Uganda.
Ábrego García's lawyers are arguing in the Federal District Court of Maryland that ICE re-arrested him without allowing him to express "fears of persecution and torture in that country."
The team is asking the court to ensure that Ábrego García "is not put on any flight to any country whatsoever, whether it's Uganda, South Sudan, what have you, unless and until he has had a full and fair trial in an immigration court as well as his full appeal rights," said Sandoval-Moshenberg.
It’s not clear what charges Abrego Garcia is facing, Simon Sandoval-Moshenberg says, or where he will be detained.
Sandoval-Moshenberg says another federal lawsuit is being filed to challenge the planned deportation to Uganda, of any other third-country. pic.twitter.com/9YYKd0hOfG
— Mikenzie Frost (@MikenzieFrost) August 25, 2025
As Common Dreams reported, when Ábrego García was released from a jail Friday in Tennessee—where he'd been held on human smuggling charges since being returned to the US in June following his mistaken deportation to El Salvador—the administration informed his legal team that it may deport him once again to Uganda.
That threat was made when Ábrego García declined an offer to be sent to Costa Rica as part of a plea deal in which he would be required to plead guilty to human smuggling.
Another lawyer for Ábrego García, Sean Hecker, said Monday that "the government's campaign of retribution continues because Mr. Abrego refuses to be coerced into pleading guilty to a case that should never have been brought."
Ábrego García's ordeal has been at the center of outrage over the Trump administration's mass deportation agenda and President Donald Trump's $6 million deal with Salvadoran President Nayib Bukele, under which hundreds of migrants have been deported to El Salvador's notorious Terrorism Confinement Center (CECOT).
Ábrego García was initially sent to CECOT in March, and US Department of Justice officials acknowledged that his deportation had been the result of an administrative error. He was accused of being a member of the gang MS-13 based on a statement from an anonymous police informant, and a judge ruled in 2019 that he could not be deported to his home country of El Salvador due to concerns over torture and persecution there.
Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem on Monday said Ábrego García was being processed for his new deportation order, but did not say where the administration plans to send him. She repeated the Trump administration's unproven claims about the Maryland resident, calling him "an MS-13 gang member, human trafficker, serial domestic abuser, and child predator" and said he would not "terrorize American citizens any longer."
Sen. Chris Van Hollen (D-Md.), who visited Ábrego García when he was imprisoned in El Salvador and demanded his release, condemned Noem for continuing to "spread lies about his case."
"Instead of spewing unproven allegations on social media, [officials] need to put up or shut up in court," said Van Hollen.
"The federal courts and public outcry forced the administration to bring Ábrego García back to Maryland, but Trump's cronies continue to lie about the facts in his case and they are engaged in a malicious abuse of power as they threaten to deport him to Uganda—to block his chance to defend himself against the new charges they brought," Van Hollen said. "As I told Kilmar and his wife Jennifer, we will stay in this fight for justice and due process because if his rights are denied, the rights of everyone else are put at risk."
Sarah Mehta, deputy director of policy and government affairs at the ACLU, said Ábrego García's arrest on Monday put "the Trump administration's obsessive and petty cruelty... on full display" and condemned the "latest move to deport Kilmar Ábrego García, a Maryland father they admitted to wrongfully deporting to a torture prison, to a country with which he has no relationship."
"This vindictive behavior is not just about Mr. Ábrego García; this is once again the administration showing that it can weaponize the law to punish people standing up for their rights and make our immigrant neighbors afraid of being rapidly exiled, including to places where they may be persecuted," said Mehta.
The Times reported Monday that Ábrego García "expressed willingness to leave the United States to accept refugee status in Costa Rica" after initially rejecting the plea deal.
An order handed down by the chief federal judge in Maryland in May requires the government to give Ábrego García a two-day reprieve before being expelled from the country following the filing of the habeas corpus petition.
Aaron Reichlin-Melnick, senior fellow at the American Immigration Council, suggested the administration has continued targeting Ábrego García simply because he and his legal team brought nationwide attention to the fact that officials had wrongly deported him and other migrants.
"The entire weight of the federal government has been brought against this man for one reason, and one reason alone," said Reichlin-Melnick. "He tried to get them to fix a mistake they admit they made."
Ábrego García acknowledged other families that have been impacted and separated by Trump's mass deportation policy before entering the ICE facility on Monday.
"To all of the families who have also suffered separations or who live under the constant threat of being separated," he said, "I want to tell you that even though this injustice is hurting us hard, we must not lose hope."
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Kilmar Abrego Garcia is 'Free' From Custody, En Route to Family in Maryland
He now awaits trial in what his lawyers argue is a "vindictive prosecution" by the Justice Department.
Aug 22, 2025
Kilmar Abrego Garcia, the Salvadoran man whom the Trump administration wrongfully deported in violation of a judge's order earlier this year, was released from custody in Tennessee on Friday.
"Today, Kilmar Abrego Garcia is free," his attorney, Sean Hecker, said. "He is presently en route to his family in Maryland, after being unlawfully arrested and deported, and then imprisoned, all because of the government's vindictive attack on a man who had the courage to fight back against the administration's continuing assault on the rule of law. He is grateful that his access to American courts has provided meaningful due process."
The Trump administration acknowledged that its deportation of Garcia to languish in a prison camp in El Salvador in March was the result of an "administrative error." But it fought to keep him there based on unsubstantiated charges that he was a member of the Salvadoran gang MS-13, even after the Supreme Court ruled 9-0 that the administration must facilitate his return.
Abrego Garcia was one of more than 200 people deported to the CECOT prison without trial—the vast majority of whom were found to have never been convicted of or even charged with a crime. While there, he says he endured beatings and psychological torture before being brought back to the United States in June.
The Justice Department hit him with charges for human smuggling, which his lawyer Simon Sandoval-Moshenberg has described as "preposterous" and a way for the Trump administration to save face after an egregious miscarriage of justice. Nearly a month after a judge ordered his release from custody, Abrego Garcia is now heading back to Maryland, where he will await trial.
His lawyers argue that the DOJ "has engaged in a vindictive prosecution, seeking to penalize Abrego Garcia for asserting his rights, rather than accepting an unjust outcome."
In a motion to dismiss the case filed this week, the attorneys argued that "such tactics are inconsistent with principles of fairness and justice, and that the prosecution should be dismissed."
As evidence of this, his lawyers have cited a claim from a former Justice Department lawyer who says he was fired after refusing to file a misleading brief claiming Abrego Garcia was a member of MS-13.
The Trump administration, which has argued that Abrego Garcia is not entitled to due process because of his immigration status, has threatened to immediately return him to Immigration and Customs and Enforcement (ICE) detention and deport him to a third country. However, last month, US District Judge Paula Xinis, who is overseeing his case, barred ICE from immediately rearresting him.
If he is taken into custody, US Magistrate Judge Barbara D. Holmes has ordered that he be given access to his attorneys.
Rep. Pramila Jayapal (D-Wash.) has said Abrego Garcia's release was "fantastic news!"
"I am thrilled for Kilmar Abrego Garcia!" she wrote on X. "The Trump administration must stop their unfounded investigations and let his family remain together."
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US Judge Pauses Abrego Garcia's Release at His Lawyers' Request
The immigrant's legal team sought the decision to protect him from swift deportation.
Jul 23, 2025
Update (5:50 pm ET):
A magistrate judge on Wednesday paused Kilmar Abrego Garcia's release from federal custody, shortly after a U.S. district judge determined that he should be freed.
Magistrate Judge Barbara Holmes in the Middle District of Tennessee halted his release for 30 days. According to CNN, "Abrego Garcia's lawyers had made the request earlier this week in an effort to ensure removal proceedings wouldn't quickly begin once he's released from custody."
Earlier:
A federal judge on Wednesday had scathing words for the Trump administration as he ordered the government to release Kilmar Abrego Garcia, an immigrant wrongly sent to El Salvador's infamous Terrorism Confinement Center.
In his ruling, Judge Waverly Crenshaw of the United States District Court for the Middle District of Tennessee stated that the government's allegations that Abrego Garcia was a member of the gang MS-13 "border on fanciful" and were far from sufficient to prove that he is too dangerous to release ahead of his trial on human smuggling charges.
In fact, Crenshaw contended that proof of Abrego Garcia's gang affiliations are "entirely absent from the record" and further stated that "there is no evidence before the court that Abrego: has markings or tattoos showing gang affiliation; has working relationships with known MS-13 members; ever told any of the witnesses that he is a MS-13 member; or has ever been affiliated with any sort of gang activity."
The judge then picked apart testimony from cooperating witnesses who claimed that Abrego Garcia in the past had provided transportation to Salvadoran immigrants who were members of both MS-13 and of rival gang Barrio 18, which for years has engaged in a bloody feud with MS-13.
"This cuts against the already slim evidence demonstrating Abrego is a member of MS-13," wrote Crenshaw. "Based on the record before it, for the court to find that Abrego is member of or in affiliation with MS-13, it would have to make so many inferences from the government's proffered evidence in its favor that such conclusion would border on fanciful."
Shortly after Crenshaw's ruling, Judge Paula Xinis of the U.S. District Court for the District of Maryland issued an order that expressly prohibited Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) officials from taking Abrego Garcia back into custody during the period leading up to his trial and said the government could not initiate deportation proceedings against him without going through standard due process.
Abrego Garcia was brought back to the United States last month after the Trump administration complied with a U.S. Supreme Court order to facilitate his return after it acknowledged months earlier that he had been improperly deported to El Salvador. Upon his return, the United States Department of Justice promptly hit him with human smuggling charges to which he has pleaded not guilty.
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Justice Under Siege: Trump and His Allies’ Assault on the Rule of Law Threatens Us All
Legal protections are meaningless if the government can disregard them at will.
Jul 21, 2025
Rule of law. Due process. Separation of powers.
Many of us were taught that these are the core principles of our government that protect us and our democracy. Now, we’re living through dire threats to these fundamental values. Since taking office, U.S. President Donald Trump has launched a relentless assault on America’s judiciary and legal system—with dire consequences for people across the country.
Trump’s systematic dismantling of judicial authority isn’t a Beltway issue for Washington insiders. The American people recognize these actions for what they are: a threat to their own rights and ability to be treated fairly by the courts. Our polling of voters in battleground states demonstrated that 74% of those voters—including Democrats, Independents, and Republicans—are concerned that Trump’s actions could allow the government to violate their rights with no consequences.
And the administration’s flouting of the law has already directly threatened Americans’ basic safety: Trump’s unprecedented deployment of the military and national guard in California, against the wishes of state and local governments, escalated an already volatile situation and put civilians in danger.
It goes without saying that our courts aren’t perfect—and, indeed, as the administration’s assault on their independence demonstrates, real reforms will be needed to our judiciary and legal system in the years ahead to right the ship.
When ordinary people are willing to take to the streets, it is time for the most powerful among us to call a spade a spade and not duck away from the full crisis facing our country.
But put simply, this administration has no respect for the separation of powers—attacking judges who issue opinions contrary to Trump’s agenda and signaling a clear willingness to circumvent the rule of law altogether.
One of the earliest examples of Trump’s defiance of lawful court orders came just a few weeks after he was sworn back into office, when Judge John McConnell Jr. ordered the unfreezing of billions in federal grant money. The administration's refusal to comply meant communities nationwide lost funding for essential services, causing mass panic and confusion across the country. When the administration ignores orders to reinstate critical support for communities, American families and children suffer.
And now, Trump and his administration openly admit to ignoring the courts. For months, the Department of Justice provided excuse after excuse for why they hadn’t facilitated the Supreme Court-ordered return of Kilmar Abrego Garcia, the Maryland father they wrongfully sent to El Salvador. Last month—though the administration continues to persecute him—Garcia was brought back to the U.S., proving that had the federal government wanted to obey the Supreme Court in April, they could have.
This creates a dangerous precedent for everyone in America: Legal protections are meaningless if the government can disregard them at will. What happens when your Social Security benefits are wrongfully denied? When your healthcare coverage is illegally terminated?
This pattern of defiance goes hand in hand with Trump and his allies’ targeting of the legal system overall.
Trump’s MAGA Republicans in Congress have filed articles of impeachment against federal judges Trump doesn’t like, and Republican leadership is advancing harmful legislation to kneecap the power of the courts. They are working to eliminate the power of the judiciary to pause Trump’s dangerous, illegal executive actions nationwide. Without this protection, your rights would depend entirely on where you live. An unconstitutional policy could be paused in California but continue harming families in Texas, Florida, and Ohio.
The administration’s shake down of our nation’s largest and most lucrative law firms similarly impacts access to justice. By punishing firms for political reasons, and then extorting them for nearly a billion dollars in legal services, Trump is trying to create a culture of fear in the legal community where few are willing to challenge government actions and all work to bolster his power.
Our judiciary or legal system overall is not perfect. Far from it. And when we’re out of this mess, work must continue to strengthen the independence and fairness of our courts.
But we need strong courts and strong lawyers more than ever at this moment. Without them, Trump and his congressional allies will have free rein to enact any and all harmful policies regardless of established law or the Constitution. And hardworking Americans who just want to care for their families and loved ones will be the ones to suffer.
But the American people are seeing right through these attempts to rig our government in favor of the rich and powerful. Since Trump’s inauguration, millions of people have participated in protests across the country.
When ordinary people are willing to take to the streets, it is time for the most powerful among us to call a spade a spade and not duck away from the full crisis facing our country.
The momentum is starting to shift: Members of Congress have begun sounding the alarm on Trump’s unprecedented attacks on judicial independence, and law firms like WilmerHale, Perkins Coie, and Jenner and Block are fighting back against Trump’s unconstitutional executive orders.
We need more courageous action. And while it is critical that the protests and civic engagement we’ve seen across the country continue, we also need that action to come from the most powerful: lawmakers at all levels of government, law firms, corporations, and university systems.
If we value our ability to seek justice when wronged and ensure equal protection under law, we must recognize our justice system is under siege. Defending our courts isn’t only about preserving institutions—it’s about protecting our rights and our freedoms before it’s too late.
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