Federal Judge Blocks ICE From Re-Detaining Kilmar Ábrego García, Says Government Had No Real Deportation Plan

The federal courthouse in Greenbelt, Maryland, has become familiar territory for attorneys arguing over the fate of Kilmar Ábrego García — but Tuesday's ruling from U.S. District Judge Paula Xinis may have delivered the most consequential blow yet to the government's attempts to remove the Salvadoran national from the country.

Xinis ruled that Immigration and Customs Enforcement cannot re-detain Ábrego García because the statutory 90-day detention window has expired and the Trump administration has failed to present any workable deportation plan US judge says wrongfully deported Kilmar Abrego Garcia can’t be re-detainedaljazeera.com·SecondaryA United States federal judge has ruled that the administration of US President Donald Trump cannot re-detain Kilmar Abrego Garcia, a Salvadoran national who was wrongfully deported last year and who the federal government has sought to deport again. US District Judge Paula Xinis stated on Tuesday that a 90-day detention period had passed without the administration presenting a workable plan to deport Abrego Garcia, whose lawyers say he is being punished because his wrongful detention.... The decision strikes at the heart of a case that has become one of the most politically charged immigration disputes of the Trump era, pitting executive enforcement powers against judicial oversight and raising uncomfortable questions about whether immigration detention is being used as punishment rather than as a tool to facilitate removal.

The ruling hinges on a straightforward legal principle: immigration detention exists to facilitate deportation, not to punish US judge says wrongfully deported Kilmar Abrego Garcia can’t be re-detainedaljazeera.com·SecondaryA United States federal judge has ruled that the administration of US President Donald Trump cannot re-detain Kilmar Abrego Garcia, a Salvadoran national who was wrongfully deported last year and who the federal government has sought to deport again. US District Judge Paula Xinis stated on Tuesday that a 90-day detention period had passed without the administration presenting a workable plan to deport Abrego Garcia, whose lawyers say he is being punished because his wrongful detention.... When the government cannot demonstrate a realistic prospect of removal in the "reasonably foreseeable future," continued detention becomes constitutionally suspect. In Ábrego García's case, Xinis found the evidence overwhelming that no viable removal plan exists.

The government "made one empty threat after another to remove him to countries in Africa with no real chance of success," Xinis wrote US judge says wrongfully deported Kilmar Abrego Garcia can’t be re-detainedaljazeera.com·SecondaryA United States federal judge has ruled that the administration of US President Donald Trump cannot re-detain Kilmar Abrego Garcia, a Salvadoran national who was wrongfully deported last year and who the federal government has sought to deport again. US District Judge Paula Xinis stated on Tuesday that a 90-day detention period had passed without the administration presenting a workable plan to deport Abrego Garcia, whose lawyers say he is being punished because his wrongful detention.... "From this, the court easily concludes that there is no 'good reason to believe' removal is likely in the reasonably foreseeable future."

The case of Ábrego García reads like a legal thriller with no satisfying resolution. He entered the United States illegally in 2011 as a teenager and settled in Maryland, where he married a U.S. citizen and had a child . In 2019, an immigration judge determined that he could not be deported to El Salvador because he faced danger there from a gang that had threatened his family — a finding that should have shielded him from removal to his home country US judge says wrongfully deported Kilmar Abrego Garcia can’t be re-detainedaljazeera.com·SecondaryA United States federal judge has ruled that the administration of US President Donald Trump cannot re-detain Kilmar Abrego Garcia, a Salvadoran national who was wrongfully deported last year and who the federal government has sought to deport again. US District Judge Paula Xinis stated on Tuesday that a 90-day detention period had passed without the administration presenting a workable plan to deport Abrego Garcia, whose lawyers say he is being punished because his wrongful detention....

That protection proved worthless last year, when ICE officers detained Ábrego García and deported him to El Salvador despite the 2019 ruling. The government later acknowledged the deportation was carried out in error US judge says wrongfully deported Kilmar Abrego Garcia can’t be re-detainedaljazeera.com·SecondaryA United States federal judge has ruled that the administration of US President Donald Trump cannot re-detain Kilmar Abrego Garcia, a Salvadoran national who was wrongfully deported last year and who the federal government has sought to deport again. US District Judge Paula Xinis stated on Tuesday that a 90-day detention period had passed without the administration presenting a workable plan to deport Abrego Garcia, whose lawyers say he is being punished because his wrongful detention.... He was held in a Salvadoran facility known for overcrowding and allegations of abuse.

The mistaken deportation triggered a political firestorm. Democratic lawmakers, led by Maryland Senator Chris Van Hollen, who personally visited Ábrego García in El Salvador, demanded his return . The case climbed to the Supreme Court, which ultimately ordered the administration to facilitate his repatriation. The Trump administration complied in June, but only after securing an indictment charging him with human smuggling in Tennessee — a move critics characterized as retaliatory US judge says wrongfully deported Kilmar Abrego Garcia can’t be re-detainedaljazeera.com·SecondaryA United States federal judge has ruled that the administration of US President Donald Trump cannot re-detain Kilmar Abrego Garcia, a Salvadoran national who was wrongfully deported last year and who the federal government has sought to deport again. US District Judge Paula Xinis stated on Tuesday that a 90-day detention period had passed without the administration presenting a workable plan to deport Abrego Garcia, whose lawyers say he is being punished because his wrongful detention....

The smuggling charges stem from a 2022 traffic stop in Tennessee. Ábrego García has pleaded not guilty to the charges US judge says wrongfully deported Kilmar Abrego Garcia can’t be re-detainedaljazeera.com·SecondaryA United States federal judge has ruled that the administration of US President Donald Trump cannot re-detain Kilmar Abrego Garcia, a Salvadoran national who was wrongfully deported last year and who the federal government has sought to deport again. US District Judge Paula Xinis stated on Tuesday that a 90-day detention period had passed without the administration presenting a workable plan to deport Abrego Garcia, whose lawyers say he is being punished because his wrongful detention.... The Trump administration has also accused him of being a member of the criminal group MS-13, though Al Jazeera reported that no evidence was offered to support that claim ICE cannot re-detain Kilmar Ábrego García, judge rulestheguardian.com·SecondaryCase became focal point for immigration after he was deported to El Salvador where he faces gang threats Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) cannot re-detain Kilmar Ábrego García because a 90-day detention period has expired and the government has no viable plan for deporting him, a federal judge ruled on Tuesday. The Salvadorian national’s case has become a focal point in the immigration debate after he was mistakenly deported to his home country last year.. A 2019 Maryland police report and a 2018 court filing did flag a possible MS-13 connection.

Since his return to the United States, the administration has pursued what Xinis characterized as a series of implausible deportation schemes. Court filings show the Department of Homeland Security explored sending Ábrego García to Uganda, Eswatini, Ghana, and Liberia — a list of destinations that the judge found lacked any serious prospect of acceptance US judge says wrongfully deported Kilmar Abrego Garcia can’t be re-detainedaljazeera.com·SecondaryA United States federal judge has ruled that the administration of US President Donald Trump cannot re-detain Kilmar Abrego Garcia, a Salvadoran national who was wrongfully deported last year and who the federal government has sought to deport again. US District Judge Paula Xinis stated on Tuesday that a 90-day detention period had passed without the administration presenting a workable plan to deport Abrego Garcia, whose lawyers say he is being punished because his wrongful detention....

Perhaps the most pointed element of Xinis's ruling was her observation about Costa Rica. The Central American nation has consistently offered to accept Ábrego García as a refugee, an offer that his legal team says he is willing to accept . Yet the administration has, in Xinis's words, "purposely — and for no reason — ignored the one country that has consistently offered to accept Abrego Garcia as a refugee, and to which he agrees to go" US judge says wrongfully deported Kilmar Abrego Garcia can’t be re-detainedaljazeera.com·SecondaryA United States federal judge has ruled that the administration of US President Donald Trump cannot re-detain Kilmar Abrego Garcia, a Salvadoran national who was wrongfully deported last year and who the federal government has sought to deport again. US District Judge Paula Xinis stated on Tuesday that a 90-day detention period had passed without the administration presenting a workable plan to deport Abrego Garcia, whose lawyers say he is being punished because his wrongful detention....

The government's position frames the dispute quite differently. Homeland Security officials have argued that Ábrego García should have been deported long ago and that the judiciary is effectively preventing enforcement agencies from carrying out their core mission US judge says wrongfully deported Kilmar Abrego Garcia can’t be re-detainedaljazeera.com·SecondaryA United States federal judge has ruled that the administration of US President Donald Trump cannot re-detain Kilmar Abrego Garcia, a Salvadoran national who was wrongfully deported last year and who the federal government has sought to deport again. US District Judge Paula Xinis stated on Tuesday that a 90-day detention period had passed without the administration presenting a workable plan to deport Abrego Garcia, whose lawyers say he is being punished because his wrongful detention.... From the administration's perspective, Ábrego García is not merely a bureaucratic mistake to be corrected — he is someone who entered the country illegally, was flagged in connection with MS-13, and was later indicted on smuggling charges. Supporters of the government's approach contend that procedural rulings like this amount to de facto amnesty.

Ábrego García's attorney, Simon Sandoval-Moshenberg, offered a sharply different interpretation. "Since judge Xinis ordered Mr Ábrego García released in mid-December, the government has tried one trick after another to try to get him re-detained," he wrote US judge says wrongfully deported Kilmar Abrego Garcia can’t be re-detainedaljazeera.com·SecondaryA United States federal judge has ruled that the administration of US President Donald Trump cannot re-detain Kilmar Abrego Garcia, a Salvadoran national who was wrongfully deported last year and who the federal government has sought to deport again. US District Judge Paula Xinis stated on Tuesday that a 90-day detention period had passed without the administration presenting a workable plan to deport Abrego Garcia, whose lawyers say he is being punished because his wrongful detention.... "In her decision today, she recognized that if the government were truly trying to remove Mr Ábrego García from the United States, they would have sent him to Costa Rica long before today."

The legal dynamics of the case illuminate a structural question that extends well beyond one man's deportation fight. Immigration law permits detention as a means of facilitating removal, but the Supreme Court has held — most notably in Zadvydas v. Davis (2001) — that indefinite detention without a realistic removal prospect raises due process concerns. The 90-day statutory window is meant to be a reasonable period for the government to execute deportation; when that window closes without progress, courts are empowered to order release.

For the administration, the Ábrego García case has become a symbol of judicial interference in immigration enforcement. For immigration advocates, it represents the dangers of an enforcement apparatus that can upend lives through bureaucratic mistakes and then compound the harm through what they describe as vindictive prosecution.

The human smuggling trial in Tennessee remains pending, and the government retains the theoretical ability to appeal Xinis's ruling. Whether the administration will shift course and pursue the Costa Rica option — or continue seeking alternatives — will likely determine the next chapter of a case that has already consumed nearly a year of federal court resources.

What remains clear is that Ábrego García, who has lived in the United States for fifteen years, married an American citizen, and fathered an American child, occupies an uncomfortable space in the immigration debate: too connected to America for a clean deportation, too politically toxic for either side to compromise, and too legally complex for any single ruling to resolve. The Greenbelt courtroom will almost certainly see his name again.