A federal judge ordered El Salvadoran citizen Kilmar Abrego Garcia released from a Tennessee prison Friday, and blocked Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers from apprehending him as he traveled to Maryland.
Attorney General Pam Bondi announced in June that Abrego Garcia had been extradited back to the United States from a prison in El Salvador to face charges related to a 2022 traffic stop in Tennessee, when the illegal alien was driving an SUV full of passengers.
The Trump administration had deported him in March, concluding he had entered the country illegally.
ABC News reported that Obama-appointed U.S. District Judge Paula Xinis ruled that the U.S. government “shall restore Abrego Garcia to his ICE Order of Supervision out of the Baltimore Field Office.”
She added that placing him under ICE supervision in Maryland, where his wife and children are located, is necessary to “provide the kind of effective relief to which a wrongfully removed alien is entitled upon return.”
Xinis issued an order in July, which requires the federal authorities to provide a 72-hour notice if they plan to deport Abrego Garcia to a third country. A 2019 court order had barred Abrego Garcia’s deportation to El Salvador, due to “fear of persecution,” ABC News noted.
Xinis wrote in her July order that it is “narrowly tailored” to allow the Trump administration to initiate “lawful immigration proceedings upon Abrego Garcia’s return to Maryland.”
Fox News correspondent Bill Melugin noted in a social media post at the time, “The government had indicated it would take him into ICE custody in Tennessee if he was released pending his federal case. Judge Xinis has now blocked the Trump administration from taking him into ICE custody upon his release.”
BREAKING: Maryland federal judge Paula Xinis has just issued an order that will block ICE from arresting “Maryland man” Kilmar Abrego Garcia upon his release on bail in Tennessee for his federal human trafficking charges. Judge Xinis is also ordering a 72 hour pause on any effort… pic.twitter.com/JKBfwnPrB8
— Bill Melugin (@BillMelugin_) July 23, 2025
Should Kilmar Abrego Garcia be deported?
Democrat lawmakers, including Sen. Chris Van Hollen of Maryland, have argued that Abrego Garcia was unlawfully removed from the U.S. by the Trump administration.
Van Hollen traveled to El Salvador in April to meet with Abrego Garcia and call for his return.
Democrat lawmakers’ demands for the illegal alien’s return became more muted when significant evidence surfaced that he is an MS-13 member, engaged in human trafficking, and battered his wife.
Abrego Garcia’s lawyer Sean Hecker said in a statement regarding Xinis’ decision to release his client on Friday, “Today, Kilmar Abrego Garcia is free. He is presently en route to his family in Maryland, after being unlawfully arrested and deported, and then imprisoned, all because of the government’s vindictive attack on a man who had the courage to fight back against the Administration’s continuing assault on the rule of law.”
BREAKING: Illegal alien MS-13 gang member Kilmar Abrego Garcia has been RELEASED from jail by a U.S. magistrate judge in Tennessee and is on his way to visit his family in Maryland as he awaits trial on federal human smuggling charges.
ICE needs to hunt this man down and arrest… pic.twitter.com/67GENbRl5T
— RedWave Press (@RedWave_Press) August 22, 2025
Hecker added that his client “is grateful that his access to American courts has provided meaningful due process.”
WBFF-TV reported that Abrego Garcia’s human smuggling trial is set to begin on Jan. 27.
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