U.S. District Judge Paula Xinis said on Aug. 25 that the Trump administration could not deport Kilmar Abrego Garcia, a Salvadoran national and suspected gang member who is facing a federal indictment for alleged human smuggling.
“At least until a schedule is set, Petitioner Kilmar Abrego Garcia is not to be moved from his current detention facility, principally to preserve access to both his criminal and habeas counsel, and further directing that he is not to be removed from the United States,” an order from Xinis read.
Her order came shortly after Abrego Garcia filed a new lawsuit in Maryland, alleging that the administration was illegally detaining him for removal to Uganda.
Xinis’s action is the latest flashpoint in an ongoing standoff between the illegal immigrant and the administration, which had deported him to El Salvador earlier this year. Abrego Garcia returned to the United States after Xinis ordered the Trump administration to facilitate his return, and he quickly faced an indictment from the Department of Justice.
He was released from a Tennessee jail on Aug. 22 and allowed to travel to Maryland, where the lawsuit said he was being detained by Immigration and Customs Enforcement.
In announcing his arrest, Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem said in an Aug. 25 social media post that “President Trump is not going to allow this illegal alien, who is an MS-13 gang member, human trafficker, serial domestic abuser, and child predator to terrorize American citizens any longer.”
Abrego Garcia’s attorney has denied that his client is a member of MS-13, and, in an earlier lawsuit, Xinis questioned the underlying evidence from an immigration proceeding during Trump’s first term of office. In the department’s May indictment, the Justice Department has stood by this characterization, accusing Abrego Garcia of using his status in MS-13 to further illegal activity.
That case is ongoing, and Abrego Garcia has moved to dismiss the indictment on the basis that the Trump administration was allegedly bringing a selective and vindictive prosecution. In the motion to dismiss, his attorney alleged that the Trump administration was retaliating against Abrego Garcia for fighting his deportation and winning.
In his Aug. 25 lawsuit, Abrego Garcia’s attorneys said that he was required to present to the ICE field office in Baltimore and did so. “At that time, without forewarning, he was taken into custody,” the lawsuit reads.
Footage posted to the Department of Homeland Security’s social media showed Abrego Garcia walking in handcuffs. “He doesn’t belong here,” the department stated. “He won’t be staying here.”
Abrego Garcia, a citizen of El Salvador, has expressed fear of persecution and torture in Uganda. He also designated Costa Rica as his preferred country of removal, according to this lawsuit. His lawsuit alleged that the government was relying on an order from 2019 to remove Abrego Garcia—leaving a removal period that would have already expired.
“Petitioner’s 90-day statutory removal period and six-month presumptively reasonable period for continued removal efforts have long since passed,” the lawsuit read. It also accused the government of violating Abrego Garcia’s due process because his detention allegedly “does not bear any reasonable relation to a legitimate government purpose and is punitive in purpose and effect.”
Abrego Garcia was one of many to file lawsuits challenging the president’s policy to detain and deport illegal immigrants across the country, prioritizing those with a criminal record. Amid an influx of those challenges, the federal district court in Maryland imposed a broad order halting removal of any person who challenged their detention for two days through habeas petitions.
The Trump administration has called this order illegal and sued each of the judges, including Xinis, in the district court. A judge from Virginia heard arguments in August over the Justice Department’s attempt to halt the order and expressed skepticism toward the administration’s case.
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