Judge Blocks Trump Administration From Detaining Kilmar Abrego Garcia After His Release

FILE – Kilmar Abrego Garcia attends a protest rally at the Immigration and Customs Enforcement field office in Baltimore, Monday, Aug. 25, 2025, to support Abrego Garcia. (AP Photo/Stephanie Scarbrough, File)

A federal judge issued an order prohibiting officials from detaining Kilmar Abrego Garcia again shortly after his release from custody.

Garcia was released on Thursday after Maryland District Judge Paula Xinis ordered his release “immediately.” Garcia’s lawyers also asked on Friday for a temporary restraining order to keep authorities from detaining their client again.

Authorities will not be able to arrest him until there is a motion on the restraining order.

“Since Abrego Garcia’s wrongful detention in El Salvador, he has been re-detained, again without lawful authority,” Xinis wrote in the original order to release Garcia.

Garcia has been thrust to the center of immigration debates since he was first deported to El Salvador’s CECOT mega-prison in March. The administration has claimed Garcia has gang ties, something he’s denied. Garcia was deported to the prison despite a 2019 order where he was denied asylum, but his removal was barred due to claims he feared for his and his family’s lives due to gang threats.

He was brought back to the United States in June to face human smuggling charges in Tennessee. He’s pleaded not guilty.

Department of Homeland Security spokesperson Tricia McLaughlin said the administration will be fighting the new order “tooth and nail.”

“I stand before you a free man and I want you to remember me this way, with my head held up high,” Garcia told a crowd outside the Baltimore Immigration and Customs Enforcement field office. “I come here today with so much hope and I thank God who has been with me since the start with my family.”

He vowed to keep fighting and said he believes he will come out OK in the end, despite the ongoing situation.

“I stand here today with my head held high and I will continue to fight and stand firm against all of the injustices this government has done upon me,” he said. “Regardless of this administration, I believe this is a country of laws and I believe that this injustice will come to an end.”