Federal judge issues order to prohibit immigration officials from detaining Kilmar Abrego Garcia

BALTIMORE AP A federal judge ordered Friday that U S immigration authorities could not detain Kilmar Abrego Garcia hours after his release from immigration detention Abrego Garcia was appearing Friday morning for a scheduled appointment at an Immigration and Customs Enforcement field office specific hours after he was distributed from detention on a judge s orders His lawyers petitioned the judge to block leadership from detaining him again Functionaries cannot re-detain him until the court conducts a hearing on the motion for the temporary restraining order U S District Judge Paula Xinis in Maryland noted Abrego Garcia became a flashpoint of the Trump administration s immigration crackdown earlier this year when he was wrongly deported to a notorious prison in El Salvador He was last taken into custody in August during a similar check-in Abrego Garcia on Friday stopped at a news conference outside the building escorted by a group of supporters chanting We are all Kilmar I stand before you a free man and I want you to remember me this way with my head held up high Abrego Garcia announced through a translator I come here at present with so much hope and I thank God who has been with me since the start with my family He urged people to keep fighting I stand here in contemporary times with my head held high and I will continue to fight and stand firm against all of the injustices this governing body has done upon me Abrego Garcia explained Regardless of this administration I believe this is a country of laws and I believe that this injustice will come to an end After Abrego Garcia spoke he went through measure at the field office escorted by supporters The agency freed him just before p m on Thursday in response to a ruling from Xinis who wrote federal executives detained him after his return to the United States without any legal basis Mistakenly deported and then returned Abrego Garcia is a Salvadoran citizen with an American wife and child who has lived in Maryland for years He immigrated to the U S illegally as a teenager to join his brother who had become a U S citizen In an immigration judge granted him protection from being deported back to his home country where he faces danger from a gang that targeted his family While he was allowed to live and work in the U S under ICE supervision he was not given residency status Earlier this year he was mistakenly deported and held in a notoriously brutal Salvadoran prison despite having no criminal record Facing mounting populace pressure and a court order Trump s Republican administration brought him back to the U S in June but only after issuing an arrest warrant on human smuggling charges in Tennessee He has pleaded not guilty to those charges and appealed a federal judge there to dismiss them A lawsuit to block removal from the US The settlement located he had a well founded fear of danger in El Salvador if he was deported there So instead ICE has been seeking to deport him to a series of African countries Abrego Garcia has sued claiming the Trump administration is illegally using the removal process to punish him for the community embarrassment caused by his deportation In her order releasing Abrego Garcia Xinis wrote that federal leadership did not just stonewall the court They affirmatively misled the tribunal Xinis also rejected the establishment s argument that she lacked jurisdiction to intervene on a final removal order for Abrego Garcia because she identified no final order had been filed ICE freed Abrego Garcia from Moshannon Valley Processing Center about miles kilometers northeast of Pittsburgh on Thursday just before the deadline Xinis gave the regime to provide an update on Abrego Garcia s release He returned home to Maryland a limited hours later Immigration check-in Check-ins are how ICE keeps track of a few people who are circulated by the governing body to pursue asylum or other immigration cases as they make their way through a backlogged court system The appointments were once routine but plenty of people have been detained at their check-ins since the start of President Donald Trump s second term Abrego Garcia s attorney Simon Sandoval-Moshenberg explained he s prepared to defend his client against further deportation efforts The cabinet still has plenty of tools in their toolbox plenty of tricks up their sleeve Sandoval-Moshenberg explained adding he fully expects the cabinet to again take approaches to deport his client We re going to be there to fight to make sure there is a fair trial The Department of Homeland Shield sharply criticized Xinis order and vowed to appeal calling the ruling naked judicial activism by a judge appointed during the Obama administration This order lacks any valid legal basis and we will continue to fight this tooth and nail in the courts declared Tricia McLaughlin the department s assistant secretary Sandoval-Moshenberg declared the judge made it clear that the establishment can t detain someone indefinitely without legal authority and that his client has endured more than anyone should ever have to Abrego Garcia has also applied for asylum in the U S in immigration court Charges in Tennessee Abrego Garcia was hit with human smuggling and conspiracy to commit human smuggling charges when the U S cabinet brought him back from El Salvador Prosecutors alleged he accepted money to transit within the United States people who were in the country illegally The charges stem from a traffic stop in Tennessee for speeding Body camera footage from a Tennessee Highway Patrol officer shows a calm exchange with Abrego Garcia There were nine passengers in the car and the officers discussed among themselves their suspicions of smuggling However Abrego Garcia was eventually allowed to continue driving with only a warning A Department of Homeland Protection agent testified at an earlier hearing that he did not begin assessing the traffic stop until after the U S Supreme Court mentioned in April that the Trump administration must work to bring back Abrego Garcia