Attorneys for Kilmar Abrego Garcia are set to appear before a federal judge in Tennessee on Thursday. Garcia was charged with alleged human smuggling in connection with a 2022 traffic stop in Tennessee.
At the time, he was pulled over with multiple people in his vehicle and accused of transporting undocumented migrants. Reports suggest that Garcia’s team is trying to get the human smuggling charges against him dismissed.
The Maryland father was wrongly deported by the Trump administration on March 15, 2025, in what officials later described as an “administrative error.”
The administration sent three flights carrying Salvadoran and Venezuelan deportees to El Salvador’s infamous Terrorism Confinement Center, falsely claiming they were all members of the Tren de Aragua gang. No public evidence was provided to support those claims in his case.
A federal judge ordered Trump’s team to turn the planes around that night. They ignored the order, arguing that the flights were already in international waters by the time the judge issued the ruling.
Kilmar Abrego Garcia to be deported after refusing plea offer https://t.co/I4PjB5lzNZ pic.twitter.com/1MiPL1dgUQ
— New York Post (@nypost) August 23, 2025
Kilmar Abrego Garcia left El Salvador after gang violence in 2011 and was granted protected status in 2019 by a judge who recognized he would be in danger if he returned.
He came to the US as a teenager and has worked as a union sheet metal apprentice under the supervision of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement for years. He is married to an American with whom he shares a specially-abled child.
Garcia’s lawyers said authorities knew he had a protected legal status, yet removed him anyway. Garcia was released from federal immigration custody after District Judge Paula Xinis issued the order on December 11.
His deportation caused a national debate questioning the credibility of the Trump administration. Kilmar Abrego Garcia’s legal team claimed that the administration issued the charges to punish him after they were asked to arrange his return to the US.
Body camera footage from a Tennessee Highway Patrol officer shows a routine incident where the 30-year-old was pulled over for speeding. There were nine passengers in the vehicle, and officers discussed alleged reports of possible smuggling. He was allowed to leave with a warning and was not arrested on the spot.
As speculation persists, Judge Waverly Crenshaw has said that there may be evidence suggesting the prosecution could be “vindictive.’ He also said that Trump‘s officials statement regarding the case “raises cause for concern.”
After reviewing contested documents, Judge Crenshaw wrote in an order unsealed in late December that some materials suggest McGuire may not have acted alone and that the decision to prosecute Garcia may have involved multiple Justice Department officials.
This is what authoritarianism looks like: Kilmar Abrego Garcia was never ordered to be removed by a judge. The Trump Administration deported him anyway—trampling rule of law and ignoring the courts.
Good to see the court rule to release him from ICE custody.…
— Senator Jeff Merkley (@SenJeffMerkley) December 12, 2025
According to WTOP News, amongst them was Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche, who seemed to suggest that the Justice Department charged Kilmar Abrego Garcia because he won the wrongful deportation case.
Garcia is one of several individuals who have been victims of Trump’s mass deportation policy. What began as a policy to deport illegal immigrants with a criminal record became a tool to abuse, detain, and deport people.
In a similar case, 21-year-old permanent resident and Columbia University junior Yunseo Chung was also held by ICE after she participated in pro-Palestine protests. She sued the administration in return after their claims of trying to deport her.
