Judge Orders Abrego Garcia’s Immediate Release from Immigration Custody

Late Update, 5:30PM ET: Kilmar Abrego Garcia has been released from ICE custody and detention according to his attorney.

A federal judge has ordered the immediate release of Kilmar Abrego Garcia, a Salvadoran man whose arrest in Maryland, illegal removal to El Salvador and return to U.S. immigration detention became a flashpoint in President Donald Trump’s lawless immigration crackdown.

U.S. District Judge Paula Xinis found Thursday that Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) had been unlawfully holding Abrego Garcia in custody for months. She ruled that he must be released by 5 p.m. ET Thursday.

Abrego Garcia, who had lived for years in Maryland, was initially taken into custody in March. Days later, the Trump administration abruptly removed him from the U.S. and flew him and hundreds of other people to a notorious Salvadoran megaprison without first giving them a chance to challenge their removals.

The removals, and Abrego Garcia’s case in particular, sparked outrage across the U.S. amid rising concerns about President Donald Trump’s effort to evade due process rights by summarily deporting both legal and nonlegal migrants from the country.

For months, the Trump administration refused to return Abrego Garcia to the U.S., despite repeatedly admitting his removal was the result of an “administrative error.” It only returned him after indicting him on immigrant smuggling charges.

Shortly after he was released in mid-August pending a trial on those charges, Abrego Garcia was again ordered to surrender to ICE for removal to another country.

However, Xinis, who was appointed by former President Barack Obama, said Thursday that ICE could not continue holding Abrego Garcia without having a final deportation order against him.

Abrego Garcia’s ongoing detention appeared “constitutionally infirm,” Xinis wrote. 

The Trump administration removed Abrego Garcia to El Salvador in violation of an immigration judge’s 2019 determination that he was likely to be persecuted and tortured by gangs that had previously threatened his family if he were sent there.

For months, the Trump administration refused to obey a previous order from Xinis requiring it to “facilitate” Abrego Garcia’s return, even after that order was affirmed both by the Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals and the Supreme Court.

Since taking him into custody a second time, the Trump administration has sought to remove Abrego Garcia to several countries — many of which refused to accept him. 

In her order Thursday, Xinis slammed the administration for misrepresenting Costa Rica’s willingness to accept Abrego Garcia. 

The judge said the government’s refusal to send Abrego Garcia to Costa Rica, his preferred country of removal, and its numerous threats to send him to an African country “all reflect that whatever purpose was behind his detention, it was not for the ‘basic purpose’ of timely third-country removal.”

The Department of Homeland Security’s (DHS) repeated attempts to again remove Abrego Garcia from the U.S. have conflicted with the Department of Justice’s (DOJ) immigration smuggling case against him. As a result, the Trump administration has flip-flopped in federal court between prosecuting the criminal case and pushing for his deportation.

In October, a federal judge found that the federal government may be pursuing the smuggling charges to punish Abrego Garcia for asserting his rights and challenging his abrupt removal to El Salvador. 

The judge said several public comments from senior DHS and DOJ officials, including Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche, could be interpreted as evidence of vindictive prosecution. 

The judge also said Abrego Garcia was entitled to discovery against the Trump administration and a hearing during which he can present evidence of why his case should be dismissed. However, the DOJ has largely slow-walked discovery proceedings.

This story has been updated with additional details throughout.