A 30-year-old Salvadoran, Kilmar Armando Abrego Garcia, was released from a Pennsylvania immigration detention center shortly after a federal judge determined that the Trump administration had been unlawfully holding him for almost four months.
U.S. District Judge Paula Xinis from the District of Maryland issued a detailed 31-page order, granting Abrego Garcia’s petition for habeas corpus and ordering the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) to release him immediately.
In her decision, Judge Xinis stated that the government had detained Abrego Garcia “without lawful authority,” pointing out the absence of a valid final removal order. She emphasized that indefinite civil detention shouldn’t be applied as a form of punishment or without a genuine deportation purpose.
Simon Sandoval-Moshenberg, the legal director at the Legal Aid Justice Center and one of Abrego Garcia’s attorneys, confirmed the release to the media on Wednesday evening.
Earlier this year, Abrego Garcia’s situation garnered significant attention when ICE deported him to El Salvador in March. This led to advocacy from left-wing activists and Democrats, referencing a 2019 immigration judge’s ruling that prohibited his removal due to credible fears of gang violence.
He spent time in El Salvador’s CECOT prison before being returned to the U.S. in August to respond to unrelated federal human smuggling charges linked to a 2019 arrest in Tennessee.
Although he was released on bond in that criminal case and placed in the care of his U.S.-citizen brother, ICE reapprehended him during a routine check-in in Baltimore and transferred him to the Pennsylvania detention facility.
The DHS expressed strong criticism of the ruling, with a spokesperson describing it as “judicial activism” that threatens the executive branch’s ability to enforce immigration laws. They’ve announced plans to appeal the decision.
Currently, Abrego Garcia is under supervised release, with a check-in scheduled at ICE’s Baltimore office on Friday. He still faces pending federal smuggling charges in Nashville, Tennessee, with no trial date set as of yet.
