Federal judge Waverly Crenshaw ruled in a July 23 court order that Kilmar Abrego Garcia should be released from federal custody and returned to his home state of Maryland, saying he is not a flight risk during federal criminal proceedings against him. Simultaneously, a second judge barred ICE from immediately taking Abrego Garcia into custody and deporting him upon his release, ordering the Trump Administration to provide Abrego 72 hours notice if it plans to execute proceedings to remove him to a “third country”, a country that is not his place of origin.
In response to the two rulings, a third judge on the same day reaffirmed her previous orders to postpone Abrego Garica’s release for 30 days, having granted an atypical request from his lawyers to keep him in US Marshal custody and thus out of the hands of immigration officials—as the lawyers claim DHS is planning to immediately deport Abrego Garcia upon his release.
Despite Abrego Garcia remaining in custody, his lawyers praised the rulings as a victory and a “critical safeguard” of his due process rights as he battles both deportation and his federal case.
Kilmar Abrego Garcia, a construction worker and father of three, was deported in March by the Trump administration to El Salvador, where he was tortured by the US imperialist lackey regime in the infamous CECOT prison. Following demonstrations demanding his release, including from his union, the Trump administration returned Abrego Garcia to the US in June and immediately initiated federal criminal proceedings against him for alleged human smuggling. Abrego Garcia was granted an immigration court order in 2019 forbidding him from being deported to El Salvador due to risk of violence.
Reaffirming that immigration officials will continue their terror tactics, a spokesperson for DHS said on social media: “The fact that this unhinged judge is trying to tell ICE they can’t arrest an MS-13 gang member indicted by a grand jury for human trafficking and subject to immigration arrest under federal law is LAWLESS AND INSANE.”
Abrego Garcia’s continuing struggle against deportation—and the federal human trafficking charges—is one of the most high profile instances in the Trump administration’s mass deportation terror campaign against immigrants, mainly workers.
The federal case against Abrego Garcia, revolving around a 2022 traffic stop in Tennessee which according to federal prosecutors implicated him in human smuggling, grows increasingly thin. Judge Crenshaw expressed he doubted during his July 23 ruling that lawyers and an ICE official who testified in the litigation were even aware of the details of the case.
Crenshaw also said that accepting prosecutors’ claim that he is an MS-13 gang member “would border on fanciful,” rejecting the government’s argument that Abrego Garcia poses a danger to the community. The judge added that the stories of the prosecution’s witnesses “evolved throughout the interview process”, casting doubts on their credibility.
Image: Kilmar Abrego Garcia in an image provided by his family.
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