Kilmar Abrego Garcia, a Salvadoran man the Trump administration wrongfully deported in March then brought back to the U.S. to face criminal charges, cannot be moved again or deported from the U.S. in the near future, a federal judge ruled on Monday.
The order comes as the Trump administration has said it intends to deport Abrego Garcia to Uganda, a threat his lawyers allege is part of a coercive negotiating tactic to get the immigrant to either plead guilty to criminal smuggling charges, which he denies, or leave the country to a nation where he doesn’t speak the language or have any ties.
“Your clients are absolutely forbidden at this juncture to remove Mr. Abrego Garcia from the continental United States,” U.S. District Judge Paula Xinis reportedly told Deputy Assistant Attorney General Drew Ensign during a hearing on Monday, making a point to ask the official if he understood her order.
“Your honor, yes,” Ensign said. “We certainly understand that.”
Abrego Garcia will not be moved until a hearing, as soon as this week, determines whether the Trump administration is following the law surrounding his potential removal, according to the judge.
The Trump administration was accused of flouting a different federal judge’s oral order in March to turn around deportation flights to El Salvador that were bound for CECOT, the same notorious prison where Abrego Garcia was temporarily held.
Judge Xinis previously sparred with federal officials over Abrego Garcia’s detention there, accusing the government of failing to comply with multiple court orders to return him from the facility, where he says he was severely beaten.
Abrego Garcia, who federal officials accuse of being a violent gang member involved in human smuggling, was released from federal criminal custody in Tennessee on Friday, after a court found that prosecutors failed to show “any evidence” that his history or arguments against him warrant his ongoing detention.
He was arrested again on Monday, under 72 hours later, by immigration officials during a check-in at an ICE office in Baltimore.
“Regardless of what happens today with ICE, promise me this, that you will keep fighting, praying, believing in dignity and liberty, not just for me but for all,” Abrego Garcia told supporters outside the ICE office before being arrested.
Federal officials argued Abrego Garcia’s team was being “misleading” when describing the threat of deportation to Uganda.
Plea negotiations had been ongoing since July, Acting U.S. Attorney for the Middle District of Tennessee Robert E. McGuire wrote in a filing on Monday.
The Salvadoran man’s attorneys have filed a variety of legal challenges against his ongoing detention and criminal case, including a petition challenging his Monday arrest.
Abrego Garcia has also requested an interview with an asylum officer, and is seeking to reopen his immigration case, arguing the government deporting him unlawfully in March could now qualify him for asylum.
Separately, the Salvadoran man has challenged the criminal smuggling case against him, which stems from a 2022 traffic stop where police pressed no charges at the time. Abrego Garcia’s attorneys have argued the case is a “vindictive” prosecution launched because the father had “the audacity to fight back, rather than accept a brutal injustice.”
Abrego Garcia entered the country illegally as a teen, fleeing gang violence in El Salvador. He was wrongly deported to his home country this March, despite an order barring his removal to El Salvador over fears of persecution.
The federal government initially declined to bring Abrego Garcia back from El Salvador even after the Supreme Court unanimously declared the deportation “illegal” and ordered the Trump administration to “facilitate” the man’s release.
Federal officials have accused him of being a member of the MS-13 gang, which he denies. Homeland Security has also publicly referred to him as a “wife beater” and “child predator,” though federal officials have not charged him with any crimes related to these claims.
His wife obtained a temporary protective order against him in 2021, accusing him of physical violence, though she later said she and her husband went to counseling and described Abrego Garcia as “a loving partner and father.”
