Kilmar Abrego Garcia, the illegal immigrant the government says is a dangerous MS-13 migrant smuggler and whom Democrats say is a wronged “Maryland man,” has been released from custody under orders from two federal judges.
One, Waverly Crenshaw Jr., said he couldn’t be held in pretrial detention on the migrant smuggling charge, and the other, Judge Paula Xinis, said he couldn’t be immediately rearrested as an illegal immigrant. Both judges are Obama appointees.
His release comes despite Trump administration figures saying he would never be returned to the U.S. nor walk free here again.
Homeland Security blamed an “unhinged” Judge Xinis for prevailing in her quest to get the illegal immigrant back home and set free.
“By ordering this monster loose on America’s streets, this judge has shown a complete disregard for the safety of the American people. We will not stop fighting till this Salvadoran man faces justice and is OUT of our country,” said Secretary Kristi Noem.
Mr. Abrego Garcia became the focal point of the deportation debate after he was wrongly placed on one of three flights that took Venezuelan and Salvadoran migrants to a terrorist prison in El Salvador in March.
He was ordered deported in 2019 but had been set free because an immigration judge said he faced persecution from a gang if he was sent back to his home country of El Salvador.
Despite that, U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement picked him up on March 12, and three days later he was in El Salvador.
His family mounted a legal battle that led to Judge Xinis ordering the government to get him back. She said his arrest and deportation were unlawful.
The administration resisted, but behind the scenes it reinvestigated a previous case where Mr. Abrego Garcia was caught transporting what police believed to be illegal immigrants in 2022. The Justice Department won an indictment on smuggling charges then brought Mr. Abrego Garcia back.
Prosecutors had asked that he be detained in Tennessee, where the criminal case was brought, pending trial.
Judge Crenshaw ruled that he didn’t rise to the level of danger or risk of flight needed to warrant pretrial detention.
Homeland Security had said it would immediately arrest him and could begin deportation proceedings to send him to another country, but that’s when Judge Xinis stepped in.
She said since his March arrest on the streets in Maryland was unlawful, the government needed to return him to his status before that — in other words, free. She has also questioned whether he is, in fact, a member of MS-13.
Homeland Security has said not only is he part of the gang — a conclusion shared by an immigration judge in 2019, and by the Prince George’s County police gang unit — but says he was also implicated in a murder in El Salvador before he came to the U.S. Prosecutors have also raised vague allegations that he solicited photos of an underaged girl here in the U.S.
Ms. Abrego Garcia’s wife also petitioned for a domestic violence protection order — though she has now been vocal in pushing for her husband’s return and release.
