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 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 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 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. He's being held at a detention facility in Farmville, Virginia, which is west of Richmond, according to ICE's website.
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 said 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 it 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.
Abrego Garcia is facing immigration proceedings with a level of legal representation and oversight that few people get, according to Ohio State University law professor César Cuauhtémoc García Hernández.
“I wish I could tell you that I am 100% confident that they’re not going to stick him on an airplane to Kampala right now,” he said, naming Uganda's capital. “But I can’t because the president is personally involved in his legal fight. The attorney general is personally involved in his legal fight ... Half the Cabinet officials know who he is.”
An earlier request for asylum
Abrego Garcia fled El Salvador at the age of 16, around 2011, because a local gang was extorting and terrorized his family, according to court records. He arrived in the U.S. without authorization and joined his brother, who had become a U.S. citizen, and settled in Maryland.
Abrego Garcia found work in construction, eventually got married and started a family. In 2019, he was detained by local police in Maryland when he arrived outside a Home Depot in search of work as a day laborer.
Authorities had been told by a confidential informant that Abrego Garcia and other men outside the store could be identified as members of MS-13 because of their clothing and tattoos. Abrego Garcia was never charged — and has repeatedly denied the allegation. He was turned over to ICE and subsequently applied for asylum.
A U.S. immigration judge denied his request because he applied more than a year after he had entered the U.S. But the immigration judge issued an order shielding Abrego Garcia from deportation to El Salvador because he established he had a well-founded fear of gang persecution.
Abrego Garcia was released under federal supervision and continued to live with his American wife and children. 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.
Wrongful deportation and his return
The deportationviolated 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.
Federal officials argue Abrego Garcia can be deported because he came to the U.S. illegally and the immigration judge’s 2019 ruling deemed him eligible for expulsion, just not to his native El Salvador.
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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
