Latest news with #wrongfuldeportation
CNN
12-06-2025
- Politics
- CNN
Kilmar Abrego Garcia's lawyers ask judge to sanction Trump administration
Attorneys for Kilmar Abrego Garcia have asked a judge to put severe sanctions on the Trump administration, saying federal officials violated court orders to prove the steps they were taking to attempt to get the wrongfully deported man out of El Salvador for weeks, before he was returned to face criminal charges. It's the latest move in the court fight over Abrego Garcia and whether the Trump administration appropriately handled the political and legal maelstrom. Abrego Garcia's lawyers say the Trump administration's violations of the court have been 'egregious' because it repeatedly refused to provide any evidence around how it was complying with court orders. 'The Government did virtually nothing,' they said in a court filing late Wednesday night. 'Nearly sixty days, ten orders, three depositions, three discovery disputes, three motions for stay, two hearings, a week-long stay, and a failed appeal later, the Plaintiffs still have seen no evidence to suggest that the Defendants took any steps, much less 'all available steps,' to facilitate Abrego Garcia's return to the United States 'as soon as possible' so that his case could be handled as it would have been had he not been unlawfully deported,' Abrego Garcia's attorneys wrote. Documents the administration turned over to Abrego Garcia's team in recent weeks had largely been already in the public record, and assertions that the State Department was discussing his return with the Salvadoran government were vague, the lawyers added. Abrego Garcia was returned to the US last week to face new federal criminal charges that accuse him of trafficking undocumented migrants across states. He is currently in federal custody and has a court hearing set for Friday in Tennessee — where he is charged — so that he may enter a plea and for a judge to decide if he will remain behind bars in the US. But District Judge Paula Xinis in Maryland had spent weeks before the indictment was unsealed demanding the Department of Homeland Security, Department of State and lawyers from the Department of Justice produce records and statements showing how the efforts were unfolding behind the scenes. 'The lengths the government has gone to resist discovery relating to these core questions raises a strong inference that the Government is trying to hide its conduct from the scrutiny of this Court, the Plaintiffs, and the public,' Abrego Garcia's lawyers wrote. 'What the Government improperly seeks to hide must be exposed for all to see.' Abrego Garcia's attorneys want Xinis to fine the government and some of its officials and either again order the administration to turn over documents or bring in a third-party 'special master' investigator to look at the administration's compliance with the court's orders. Abrego Garcia was mistakenly sent to the CECOT prison in El Salvador in March, despite a US immigration court order that said he could not be deported there for his own safety. Even President Donald Trump himself resisted stepping in, despite court orders that Abrego Garcia be returned and given due process. The case has become emblematic of the Trump administration's hasty attempts to send migrants out of the US without proper constitutionally-guaranteed proceedings. It's also among a small group of cases related to the hardline immigration approach where judges are now considering sanctions or even holding federal officials in contempt of court for failing to abide by judicial orders. Weeks ago Xinis told the Trump administration it must 'facilitate' Abrego Garcia's return and provide information about how it was doing so. She also ordered a handful of administration officials to sit for depositions. While those sworn interviews happened behind closed doors, the officials refused to answer many questions, citing privileges, Abrego Garcia's attorneys wrote on Wednesday. 'More than 90 times, the Government instructed them not to answer on the basis of an asserted privilege,' Abrego Garcia's lawyers told the judge about the depositions. 'And when they did answer, the witnesses uniformly testified that they lacked personal knowledge of the very topics concerning which they had previously provided sworn declarations.' The lawyers also argue that the DHS' top attorney, acting general counsel Joseph Mazzara, may have given untruthful testimony. The Trump administration hasn't yet responded to the accusations made in court. CNN has also reached out to DHS for comment.
CNN
12-06-2025
- Politics
- CNN
Kilmar Abrego Garcia's lawyers ask judge to sanction Trump administration
Attorneys for Kilmar Abrego Garcia have asked a judge to put severe sanctions on the Trump administration, saying federal officials violated court orders to prove the steps they were taking to attempt to get the wrongfully deported man out of El Salvador for weeks, before he was returned to face criminal charges. It's the latest move in the court fight over Abrego Garcia and whether the Trump administration appropriately handled the political and legal maelstrom. Abrego Garcia's lawyers say the Trump administration's violations of the court have been 'egregious' because it repeatedly refused to provide any evidence around how it was complying with court orders. 'The Government did virtually nothing,' they said in a court filing late Wednesday night. 'Nearly sixty days, ten orders, three depositions, three discovery disputes, three motions for stay, two hearings, a week-long stay, and a failed appeal later, the Plaintiffs still have seen no evidence to suggest that the Defendants took any steps, much less 'all available steps,' to facilitate Abrego Garcia's return to the United States 'as soon as possible' so that his case could be handled as it would have been had he not been unlawfully deported,' Abrego Garcia's attorneys wrote. Documents the administration turned over to Abrego Garcia's team in recent weeks had largely been already in the public record, and assertions that the State Department was discussing his return with the Salvadoran government were vague, the lawyers added. Abrego Garcia was returned to the US last week to face new federal criminal charges that accuse him of trafficking undocumented migrants across states. He is currently in federal custody and has a court hearing set for Friday in Tennessee — where he is charged — so that he may enter a plea and for a judge to decide if he will remain behind bars in the US. But District Judge Paula Xinis in Maryland had spent weeks before the indictment was unsealed demanding the Department of Homeland Security, Department of State and lawyers from the Department of Justice produce records and statements showing how the efforts were unfolding behind the scenes. 'The lengths the government has gone to resist discovery relating to these core questions raises a strong inference that the Government is trying to hide its conduct from the scrutiny of this Court, the Plaintiffs, and the public,' Abrego Garcia's lawyers wrote. 'What the Government improperly seeks to hide must be exposed for all to see.' Abrego Garcia's attorneys want Xinis to fine the government and some of its officials and either again order the administration to turn over documents or bring in a third-party 'special master' investigator to look at the administration's compliance with the court's orders. Abrego Garcia was mistakenly sent to the CECOT prison in El Salvador in March, despite a US immigration court order that said he could not be deported there for his own safety. Even President Donald Trump himself resisted stepping in, despite court orders that Abrego Garcia be returned and given due process. The case has become emblematic of the Trump administration's hasty attempts to send migrants out of the US without proper constitutionally-guaranteed proceedings. It's also among a small group of cases related to the hardline immigration approach where judges are now considering sanctions or even holding federal officials in contempt of court for failing to abide by judicial orders. Weeks ago Xinis told the Trump administration it must 'facilitate' Abrego Garcia's return and provide information about how it was doing so. She also ordered a handful of administration officials to sit for depositions. While those sworn interviews happened behind closed doors, the officials refused to answer many questions, citing privileges, Abrego Garcia's attorneys wrote on Wednesday. 'More than 90 times, the Government instructed them not to answer on the basis of an asserted privilege,' Abrego Garcia's lawyers told the judge about the depositions. 'And when they did answer, the witnesses uniformly testified that they lacked personal knowledge of the very topics concerning which they had previously provided sworn declarations.' The lawyers also argue that the DHS' top attorney, acting general counsel Joseph Mazzara, may have given untruthful testimony. The Trump administration hasn't yet responded to the accusations made in court. CNN has also reached out to DHS for comment.
New York Times
12-06-2025
- Politics
- New York Times
Lawyers for Returned Deportee Seek Sanctions Against Trump Officials
For the better part of two months, lawyers for Kilmar Armando Abrego Garcia, the Maryland immigrant who was wrongfully deported to El Salvador in March, have been complaining loudly about the Trump administration's persistent efforts to dodge court orders instructing it to work toward freeing him from Salvadoran custody. Their search for accountability continued even after the White House brought Mr. Abrego Garcia back to the United States last week — albeit to face an indictment that was investigated and filed while he was overseas. But late on Wednesday night, the lawyers sent the federal judge handling the case their most detailed inventory yet of what they described as the administration's 'sustained and flagrant' violations. The lawyers also asked the judge, Paula Xinis, to do something about it. They said that they wanted her to appoint a special master to investigate the failure by Trump officials to comply with her instructions and to impose financial penalties, if warranted, as a punishment for contempt. The 33-page filing by the lawyers contained a litany of purported wrongdoing by the Trump administration and accused officials in the Homeland Security and Justice Departments of throwing up evasions at every turn, harboring a disdain for the judicial process and, in one instance, potentially lying under oath. It gave a strong flavor of the lawyers' frustration after almost two months of failing to get answers to the question of what the White House had been doing to secure Mr. Abrego Garcia's release before it suddenly changed course last Friday by bringing him back to face indictment. 'Nearly 60 days, 10 orders, three depositions, three discovery disputes, three motions for stay, two hearings, a weeklong stay and a failed appeal later,' the lawyers wrote, 'the plaintiffs still have seen no evidence to suggest that the defendants took any steps, much less 'all available steps,' to facilitate Abrego Garcia's return to the United States 'as soon as possible' so that his case could be handled as it would have been had he not been unlawfully deported.' Want all of The Times? Subscribe.
New York Times
12-06-2025
- Politics
- New York Times
Defense Lawyers for Returned Deportee Ask Judge to Release Him Pretrial
Defense lawyers for Kilmar Armando Abrego Garcia, the Salvadoran immigrant who was recently brought back to the United States to face a federal indictment after being wrongfully deported to a prison in El Salvador, said in court papers on Wednesday that he should remain free from custody as he awaits trial. The papers, filed in Federal District Court in Nashville, amounted to the opening salvo of efforts by the defense lawyers to challenge the charges that were filed last week against Mr. Abrego Garcia. 'With no legal process whatsoever, the United States government illegally detained and deported Kilmar Abrego Garcia and shipped him to the Center for Terrorism Confinement (CECOT) in El Salvador, one of the most violent, inhumane prisons in the world,' the lawyers wrote. 'The government now asks this court to detain him further,' they went on, asking Judge Waverly D. Crenshaw Jr., who is handling the criminal case, to deny the request. Judge Crenshaw is set to hold a hearing on Friday to arraign Mr. Abrego Garcia and to hear arguments about whether to detain him before the trial. Mr. Abrego Garcia, a metalworker who was living in Maryland when he was arrested on March 12 and summarily deported three days later to El Salvador, had for weeks been trying through lawyers representing him in a separate civil case to enforce a court order instructing the Trump administration to take active measures toward securing his freedom. But after the administration repeatedly sought to sidestep and delay complying with that order, the Justice Department abruptly changed course. Top department officials announced on Friday that Mr. Abrego Garcia had been brought back to the United States to stand trial on charges of taking part in a yearslong conspiracy to smuggle thousands of undocumented immigrants across the country as a member of the violent street gang MS-13. Want all of The Times? Subscribe.
Reuters
09-06-2025
- Politics
- Reuters
Abrego Garcia's return should not end Trump contempt probe, lawyers say
NEW YORK, June 9 (Reuters) - The return of Kilmar Abrego Garcia to the U.S. last Friday after his wrongful deportation to El Salvador in March should not end a judge's investigation into whether Trump administration officials should be held in contempt for violating a court order, Abrego Garcia's lawyers said. In a court filing on Sunday, Abrego Garcia's lawyers disputed the administration's assertion that it was in compliance with Greenbelt, Maryland-based U.S. District Judge Paula Xinis' order to facilitate his return from El Salvador because it had brought him back to face criminal charges of migrant smuggling in Tennessee. "Until the Government is held accountable for its blatant, willful, and persistent violations of court orders at excruciating cost to Abrego Garcia and his family, this case is not over," Abrego Garcia's lawyers wrote, opens new tab. "The executive branch's wanton disregard for the judicial branch has left a stain on the Constitution." Spokespeople for the White House, the Justice Department and the Department of Homeland Security did not immediately respond to requests for comment. Abrego Garcia's March 15 deportation to his native El Salvador, despite a 2019 immigration court ruling that he not be sent there because he could be persecuted by gangs, has emerged as a flashpoint for Republican President Donald Trump's aggressive immigration policies. Trump critics say the deportation of Garcia, a 29-year-old who had a work permit and whose wife and young child in Maryland are U.S. citizens, was a sign that the administration was disregarding civil liberties in its push to step up deportations. Critics also said the administration's failure to bring him back, even after the U.S. Supreme Court upheld Xinis' order that it facilitate his return, suggested the Trump administration was willing to defy unfavorable court rulings even though the judiciary is a co-equal branch of government under the U.S. Constitution. Xinis on April 15 demanded U.S. officials provide documents and answer questions under oath about what it had done to facilitate Abrego Garcia's return, in an investigation that could result in officials being held in contempt. Trump administration officials have accused the judiciary of overstepping and interfering with the executive branch's ability to conduct foreign policy. They also alleged Abrego Garcia was a member of the MS-13 gang, though he had not been charged with a crime at the time of his deportation. Officials on Friday portrayed Abrego Garcia's criminal indictment as vindication for their approach to deportations. A grand jury in Nashville, Tennessee, on May 21 indicted him on charges of transporting undocumented migrants from the U.S.-Mexico border to locations around the country. Abrego Garcia has not yet entered a plea and is detained pending his next court hearing on Friday. His lawyer has called the criminal charges "fantastical." In their filing on Sunday, Abrego Garcia's lawyers said his immigration case would need to be handled as it would have been if he were not deported in order for the administration to be in compliance with Xinis' order. It was not immediately clear when Xinis would rule.
