WASHINGTON (AP) — Kilmar Abrego Garcia, whose case has come to encapsulate much of President Donald Trump ’s hard-line immigration agenda, wants to seek asylum in the United States, his lawyers told a federal judge Wednesday.
The asylum request — Abrego Garcia’s second, after a denial in 2019 — has been submitted in a Maryland immigration court, further complicating his complex immigration case that intensified in March when he was wrongfully deported to a notorious prison in his native El Salvador.
The Trump administration maintains that Abrego Garcia, 30, is part of the dangerous MS-13 gang — an allegation he denies — and has said it intends to deport him to the African country of Uganda.
If Abrego Garcia's new asylum request is approved, it could provide a green card and a path to citizenship. But his petition must go through the U.S. immigration court system, which is not part of the judiciary but an arm of the Department of Justice and under the Trump administration's authority.
Asylum or deportation
Immigration courts have become a key focus of Trump’s renewed immigration enforcement efforts. The president has fired more than 50 immigration judges since he returned to the White House in January.
But Abrego Garcia has something that most people in his situation lack: A team of lawyers fighting for him and a federal judge who is monitoring his immigration case.
His attorneys filed a lawsuit before U.S. District Court Judge Paula Xinis in Maryland to ensure that Abrego Garcia can exercise his constitutional right to fight against deportation in immigration court. They also have also argued he has the right to express fear of persecution and torture in Uganda. Abrego Garcia has told authorities he would prefer to be sent to Costa Rica if he must be removed from the U.S.
Xinis stated explicitly during a conference call with lawyers Wednesday morning that she will not — and cannot — rule on whether Abrego Garcia is granted asylum or is deported.
“We have the understanding that the asylum process is of no moment to me,” Xinis said. “I don’t have jurisdiction over that.”
But Xinis said she can weigh in to ensure Abrego Garcia is allowed to exercise his right to due process. His attorneys say he is entitled to immigration court proceedings and appeals, including to the U.S. Court of Appeals, before he can be deported.
Xinis said she'll focus on whether Abrego Garcia goes through required immigration court process or “if there is no process."
“But there could be shades of that,” she said.
The government cannot remove Abrego Garcia from the continental U.S. before an evidentiary hearing for the lawsuit on Oct. 6, Xinis ruled. She also ordered that he be kept within 200 miles (320 kilometers) of her court in Greenbelt to ensure he can access his lawyers, who said Monday that he's in a Virginia detention facility.
Abrego Garcia was released Friday from a jail in Tennessee, where he has been charged with human smuggling. U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents detained him in Baltimore on Monday and told him he would be deported to Uganda.
During Wednesday’s conference call, Justice Department attorney Drew Ensign said the government disagrees with the court’s order not to remove Abrego Garcia while the lawsuit is pending, but that the government will comply.
Abrego Garcia’s lawyers say sending him to Uganda would be punishment for successfully fighting his deportation to El Salvador, refusing to plead guilty to the smuggling charges and for seeking release from jail in Tennessee.
An earlier request for asylum
A U.S. immigration judge denied his request for asylum in 2019 because he applied more than a year after he entered the U.S. He left El Salvador at the age of 16, around 2011, to join his brother, who had become a U.S. citizen and was living in Maryland.
Although he was denied asylum, the immigration judge did issue an order shielding Abrego Garcia from deportation to El Salvador because he faced credible threats of violence from a gang there that had terrorized him and his family. He was granted a form of protection known as “withholding of removal,” which prohibits authorities from sending him to El Salvador but allows his deportation to another country.
Following the 2019 ruling, Abrego Garcia was released under federal supervision and continued to live with his American wife and children in Maryland. He checked in with ICE each year, received a federal work permit and was working as a sheet metal apprentice earlier this year, his lawyers have said.
But in March, the Trump administration deported Abrego Garcia to a notorious El Salvador prison, alleging he was a member of MS-13.
The allegation stems from a day in 2019 when Abrego Garcia sought work as a day laborer at a Home Depot in Maryland. Authorities had been told by a confidential informant that Abrego Garcia and other men could be identified as members of MS-13 because of their clothing and tattoos. He was detained by police, but Abrego Garcia was never charged — and has repeatedly denied the allegation. He was turned over to ICE and that’s when he applied for asylum for the first time.
Wrongful deportation and return
His deportation in March violated the immigration judge’s 2019 order barring his removal to El Salvador. Abrego Garcia’s wife sued to bring him back. Facing mounting pressure and a U.S. Supreme Court order, the Trump administration returned Abrego Garcia to the U.S. in June, where he was charged with human smuggling, a federal offense.
Abrego Garcia is accused of taking money to transport people who were in the country illegally. He has pleaded not guilty and asked the judge to dismiss the case, saying it was filed to punish him for challenging his deportation.
The charges stem from a 2022 traffic stop for speeding in Tennessee. There were nine passengers in the SUV and Abrego Garcia had $1,400 in cash on him. While officers discussed among themselves their suspicions of smuggling, he was allowed to drive away with only a warning.
A Homeland Security agent testified that he didn’t begin investigating until this April, when the government was facing mounting pressure to return Abrego Garcia to the U.S. The trial is set for January.
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Finley reported from Norfolk, Virginia. Associated Press writer Elliot Spagat contributed to this report.
Michael Kunzelman And Ben Finley, The Associated Press
