Nashville, June 27, 2025 – It is a legal paradox that seems almost incomprehensible: the attorneys of a man who was wrongfully deported from the United States are now asking that he remain in jail - out of fear that the country might try to get rid of him again before he has ever been convicted. Kilmar Abrego Garcia, a construction worker from Maryland, was deported in March to his native El Salvador in violation of a valid deportation ban - even though a U.S. immigration judge had already ruled in 2019 that he faced immediate danger from gangs there. Only through public pressure, a Supreme Court decision, and growing attention to Trump’s radical immigration policies was he brought back to the U.S. in early June - not as a free man, but as a defendant. The U.S. government accuses him of human smuggling. But his attorneys call the charges fabricated - a political maneuver to retroactively justify an unlawful deportation.
Now his release hangs in the balance - not because Judge Barbara Holmes considers him dangerous. On the contrary, she already ruled on Sunday that Abrego Garcia poses neither a flight risk nor a danger to the public. She even outlined specific conditions: Abrego Garcia was to live with his brother, a U.S. citizen, in Maryland. But she hesitated - fearing that immigration authorities could detain and deport him immediately upon release. In a new motion, his defense team has now explicitly asked that he remain in custody - at least until the next hearing on July 16. Their reasoning: the contradictory statements from the Trump administration make any legal assurance impossible. The attorneys’ argument is both unusual and bitter. “The irony of this request is not lost on anyone,” they wrote. But recent statements from government officials have shattered trust. A Justice Department spokesman told the press on Thursday that Abrego Garcia would “not walk free in our country again” - and accused him, without trial, of “horrific crimes, including trafficking children.” Just hours earlier, however, a government attorney in Maryland had stated that the U.S. planned to deport him to a “third country” - not back to El Salvador, but somewhere else, with no specific timeline. For the defense, this was a clear contradiction of prior statements - and proof that the situation is far from under control.
The defense also pointed to an official post on X from White House spokesperson Abigail Jackson: “Abrego Garcia was returned to the United States to face trial for the egregious charges against him,” she wrote. “He will face the full force of the American justice system - including serving time in an American prison.” But according to his attorneys, this “force” has so far been almost entirely rhetorical - not grounded in due process. “In a just world, Mr. Abrego Garcia would not want to remain in detention any longer. But in this world, the government - at every level - has promised the American people that it brought him home to face American justice. And yet there appears to be little actual interest in bringing this case to trial.” The charges against Abrego Garcia stem from a 2022 traffic stop in Tennessee, during which he was transporting nine other people without luggage. The case is old. Authorities have not presented any new evidence, and we, like many observers, see the prosecution as a symbolic performance - an attempt to cover up a mistake by criminalizing the victim. If the defense’s request is granted, Abrego Garcia would remain in detention at least until mid-July - for perhaps the most extraordinary reason currently seen in the American justice system: not because of guilt, but because the state itself is not to be trusted.
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