The federal judge overseeing Salvadoran Kelmar Abrego Garcia’s immigration case is scheduled to hear arguments Monday on whether ICE should be allowed to redetain Abrego Garcia while the government tries to deport him to Liberia or another country.
Abrego Garcia was released on December 11 after U.S. District Judge Paula Chinis found that the government had arrested him “without lawful authority.”
In part, Judge Shenis said he did not issue a formal deportation order during immigration proceedings in 2019, when the judge also blocked the government from deporting him to his native El Salvador because of his fear of persecution.
After Abrego Garcia was released, an immigration judge “corrected” the error and added the deportation order to his record, finding that it had been “erroneously deleted.”
Abrego Garcia, who lived in Maryland with his wife and children, did as well They were deported in March To the massive CECOT prison in El Salvador, despite a 2019 court order preventing his extradition to that country, after the Trump administration claimed he was a member of the MS-13 criminal gang, which he denies.
Kelmar Abrego Garcia speaks during a rally before mandatory screening at the Immigration and Customs Enforcement office in Baltimore, December 12, 2025.
Stephanie Scarbrough/AP
It was Returned to the United States in June to face human smuggling charges in Tennessee, after which Judge Shenis released him from ICE custody while he awaits trial. He is scheduled to stand trial on the Tennessee charges, to which he has pleaded not guilty, in January.
On Friday, his lawyers filed a motion seeking sanctions against the Trump administration for allegedly violating a court order that barred officials from making extrajudicial statements that could affect the case. After Abrego Garcia was released from ICE detention, Border Patrol Chief Gregory Bovino called him an “alien smuggler” and “wife beater” on national television, his lawyers said.
