A federal judge ordered Maryland father Kilmar Abrego Garcia to be released from custody on Thursday night, making for the latest major setback in the Trump administration’s bigoted immigration agenda.
Abrego Garcia’s release was ordered after U.S. District Judge Paula Xinis ruled that the administration could not detain the Maryland resident any longer.
“I stand before you a free man and I want you to remember me this way, with my head held up high,” Abrego Garcia said via a translator at a news conference on Friday, outside an Immigration and Customs Enforcement office. “I come here today with so much hope and I thank God who has been with me since the start with my family.”
Khinis said Abrego Garcia was detained for almost four months by the Trump administration “without lawful authority.” In her decisionthe judge revealed that officials never secured a valid final order to take Abrego Garcia and deport him.
During a press conference on Thursday, White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt, who has a long history of lying about the administration’s actions, complained about the judge’s decision.
“The White House, the administration, oppose this activism from a judge who is really acting as a judicial activist, which unfortunately we have seen in many cases across the country,” she said, falsely adding that Abrego Garcia “is present in our country illegally.”
Abrego Garcia has legal protected status in the U.S. and is married to a citizen, with whom he shares a son. In March, the Trump administration wrongfully detained and deported him to El Salvador’s brutal CECOT prison as part of President Donald Trump’s anti-immigration policy.
As the case unraveled, the administration leveled a series of accusations and claims about Abrego Garcia that were repeatedly debunked.
Officials like Attorney General Pam Bondi promoted the evidence-free claim that the man was part of a criminal gang. Speaking in the Oval Office in April, Trump held up a doctored image that he claimed was proof that Abrego Garcia was a member of the MS-13 gang.
The case became a national news story after Democratic members of Congress visited El Salvador with the goal of securing Abrego Garcia’s release.
In April, Maryland Sen. Chris Van Hollen met with Abrego Garcia when he was in custody and there was an open question if he was even still alive. A House Democratic delegation also visited El Salvador to bring attention to the case and get Abrego Garcia home.
The gambit worked, and the ensuing legal fallout has exposed the falsehoods and rot behind one of the Trump administration’s signature immigration cases. Trump has turned the immigration system into a key weapon in his racist suite of policies—and it’s backfiring on him.
