A magistrate judge paused Kilmar Abrego Garcia's release from federal custody Wednesday, shortly after a separate judge ruled that Abrego, who was mistakenly deported in March to El Salvador, should be released while he awaits trial on human smuggling charges.
U.S. Magistrate Judge Barbara Holmes in the Middle District of Tennessee ordered Abrego’s release from federal custody paused for 30 days or until further court order.
“Abrego shall therefore remain in the custody of the United States Marshal pending further order,” she wrote.
The pause, which both parties asked for, will allow the government the opportunity to appeal and Abrego’s legal team the chance to seek further relief.
It followed back-to-back rulings from U.S. District Judges Waverly Crenshaw in Nashville, Tennessee, and Judge Paula Xinis in Maryland that ordered Abrego's release and blocked his detention by immigration authorities in Tennessee.
Crenshaw denied the Trump administration’s motion to block Abrego’s release, writing that the government “fails to provide any evidence that there is something in Abrego’s history, or his exhibited characteristics, that warrants detention.”
“The pieces of evidence the Government cites to, taken alone or together, warrant a finding that Abrego is, at best, a low risk of nonappearance,” Crenshaw wrote. “The Court agrees with Abrego that the nature of the crimes he is accused of do not, on their own, fall within the categories of crimes Congress specifically enumerated as warranting a presumption of detention.”
Minutes after Crenshaw’s order, Xinis issued an order blocking the government from taking Abrego into immigration custody in Tennessee.
At recent hearings for Abrego's case, Xinis had expressed concern that he would be deported immediately if he were released from federal custody.
"The Court shares Plaintiffs’ ongoing concern that, absent meaningful safeguards, Defendants may once again remove Abrego Garcia from the United States without having restored him to the status quo ante and without due process," Xinis wrote in Wednesday's order.
She also ruled that the government must restore Abrego to Immigration and Customs Enforcement supervision in Baltimore and that if third-country removal proceedings are initiated, the government must give Abrego and his counsel 72 "business hours" notice of the intended third country.
One of Abrego's attorneys, Simon Sandoval-Moshenberg, hailed Crenshaw and Xinis' rulings and said that the government has been acting against the law, including when it deported Abrego.
"These rulings are a powerful rebuke of the government’s lawless conduct and a critical safeguard for Kilmar’s due process rights,” Sandoval-Moshenberg said.
Abrego’s deportation case has generated national headlines for months amid the Trump administration’s broader push to reshape immigration policy in the United States.
Abrego, 29, was deported to a notorious mega-prison in El Salvador in March, in what the government called an "administrative error." His deportation was in direct violation of an order a judge issued in 2019 to prevent his deportation to El Salvador, where he was born and claimed to have been in danger of gang violence.
Abrego was brought back to the United States last month after months of legal back-and-forth between his defense and the federal government.
Upon his return, he was immediately charged with two federal felonies in U.S. District Court in Nashville: conspiracy to unlawfully transport illegal aliens for financial gain and unlawful transportation of illegal aliens for financial gain.
Abrego has pleaded not guilty to both charges.
For months, the Trump administration has repeatedly accused Abrego of being a violent member of an international crime gang, MS-13, which Abrego’s attorneys and family members have denied.
Crenshaw was not convinced by the administration’s assertion.
“Based on the record before it, for the Court to find that Abrego is member of or in affiliation with MS-13, it would have to make so many inferences from the Government’s proffered evidence in its favor that such conclusion would border on fanciful," he said.
Abrego’s attorneys asked Crenshaw on Tuesday to order members of the Trump administration to stop commenting on the case.
They pointed to a news conference in Nashville last week at which Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem referred to Abrego as a "horrible human being."
"He has a lifetime history of trafficking individuals and of taking advantage of minors, soliciting pornography from them, nude photos of them, abusing his wife, abusing other illegals, aliens that were in this country, women that were under his care while he was trafficking them," Noem said. "He's a horrible human being and a monster, and he should never be released free."
On Wednesday, Crenshaw wrote that the Trump administration "fails to show by a preponderance of the evidence — let alone clear and convincing evidence — that Abrego is such a danger to others or the community that such concerns cannot be mitigated by conditions of release."
In a statement after the rulings Wednesday, Department of Homeland Security spokesperson Tricia McLaughlin again referred to Abrego as a member of MS-13.
“The facts remain, this MS-13 gang member, human trafficker and illegal alien will never walk America’s streets again. The fact this unhinged judge is trying to tell ICE they can’t arrest an MS-13 gang member, indicted by a grand jury for human trafficking, and subject to immigration arrest under federal law, is LAWLESS AND INSANE," she said in a statement.
“Kilmar Abrego Garcia will remain in criminal custody for the time being. It will be a cold day in hell before this criminal illegal alien is back on American streets," she said.
